Au bord de l’anarchie

Edge of Collapse #4

by Kyla Stone, Literary Queens (translator), Christelle Livoury (translator)

Alors que le monde sombre dans l’anarchie, avoir un foyer signifie tout...

Trois semaines après la panne du réseau électrique national, le chaos règne. Les réserves de nourriture se sont taries. Le carburant commence à manquer. Et l’hiver sombre et brutal est implacable.

Fall Creek a forgé une paix précaire, mais le coût de la sécurité s’avère plus élevé que ce que certains sont prêts à payer. La ville est une poudrière prête à exploser.

Noah s’efforce de maintenir l’ordre alors même que les dissensions et les conflits menacent de détruire la communauté. La sécurité de son fils étant en jeu, un mauvais choix pourrait s’avérer dévastateur.

Pour Hannah, retrouver son foyer est enfin envisageable. Mais ce ne sera pas du tout comme elle s’y attendait...

Lorsque le pays sombre, des gens ordinaires doivent faire face à la fin du monde tel qu’ils le connaissent. Alors que la société s’effondre sous leurs yeux, ils vont tout risquer pour protéger leur foyer et les gens qu’ils aiment.

L’auteure à succès de USA Today, Kyla Stone, nous offre la série encensée Edge of Collapse, une saga apocalyptique captivante mettant en scène des personnages complexes et imparfaits, ainsi que des aventures riches en action et en rebondissements. Ne passez pas à côté de ce thriller de survie parfait pour les fans de La Route, Silo et The Last of Us.

*Bestseller à un million d’exemplaires*
*Amazon Top 100*
*Gagnant du prix Kindle All-Star*

*Classé PG-13 en raison d’un langage légèrement vulgaire et de la présence de scènes de violence modérée*

Ce que les lecteurs en pensent :
« De l’action non-stop du début à la fin et on ne sait jamais à quoi s’attendre ensuite ! Kyla Stone est de loin mon auteure préférée. Elle donne vie aux personnages comme personne d’autre ne peut le faire ! »

« Mon adrénaline montait tellement que je ne pouvais pas poser le livre. Je l’ai lu en une journée... J’ADORE, J’ADORE, J’ADORE ! »

« Ces personnages vont vous entraîner dans leur vie et se frayer un chemin dans votre cœur ! Vous allez vous retrouver à rire, à pleurer, à vous réjouir et à vous morfondre en même temps qu’eux. »

« Vous ne pouvez vous tromper avec aucun des livres de cette auteure, mais celui-ci est le joyau de la couronne ! Ses personnages sont complexes et son écriture est si descriptive que l’on a l’impression d’y être. Ce n’est pas une histoire prévisible et typique d’IEM ! »

« Ma femme et moi avons lu la série ensemble. Alors, quand ce livre est sorti, nous avons littéralement fait la course pour le lire. Nous ne pouvions pas le poser et nous l’avons terminé en une journée ! »

Genres: Post Apocalyptic, Dystopia, Audiobook, Thriller, Fiction, Apocalyptic, Science Fiction

356 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 10, 2020

Reviews

[Fred Barnes]

☆☆☆☆

SOMETIMES THE MONSTERS AND THE EVIL IN THE WORLD COMES FROM THOSE THAT ARE STANDING RIGHT NEXT TO US

Edge of Anarchy: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survival Thriller (Edge of Collapse Book 4) by Kyla Stone is a well written tell about a woman who was kidnapped and held against her will for five years and only escapes the evil phycho who put her through unbelievable torture. Hannah's only means of escape was due to the electronic door locks no longer working due to an EMP that took down all electronics.

With help Liam, a former soldier and Ghost, a large white Great Pyrenees dog, they work & fight their way towards Hannah's hometown and her husband and eight year old son.

This is a story full of action, suspense, and mind-blowing struggles and twists and turns. Just when you think you know who are the good guys and who is the bad guys, Kyla will throw you a turn that will blow your mind. It's about both heroes and villains.

This book and series is one that will keep your interest throughout. I have enjoyed this book and series and hope you will too.

[RedRedtheycallmeRed]

Finally! We get some resolution with Pike, it seemed to be dragging on too long. Of course when the time comes, Hannah has a TSTL moment and I wanted to bang my head on the nearest desk. Thankfully, Ghost continues to be a hero.

Noah has moved from meh to total coward, Liam is about 10% less dour, Quinn is still the best character, and Bishop got the best scene in the book. I'm glad he's getting a bigger character arc. A huge showdown seems imminent.

[Tracey]

This is a fantastic entry in Kyla Stone's action packed, Edge of Collapse series, which is best when read in order. I cannot wait to read the next installment! Stacey Glemboski does a wonderful job narrating the audiobook.

[Carla]

In this book we dive deeper in the mind of the characters.
I’m in love with this story.
It’s worth reading.

[Deni]

~4.75✰~
"He would crawl to her if he had to."

He got stuck in a snowstorm, wounded and their dog found him and he said: "Take me to our girl. Take me to Hannah."

"Bring him back to me." (Hannah)
STOP MAKING ME CRY😭

[Maria Vargas]

I'm going to start ignoring the covers because they don't seem to match with what will happen in the story. On some good news, this book was finally really good and pack with a lot of action!

❄️ I'm so freaking proud of Hannah 👏🏽! Even when she was terrified of Pike, nothing would get in her way when it's time to protect your own child. Hannah can finally enjoy some mental peace... for now.
❄️ Noah keeps showing how fucking stupid he really is. How the hell is he even a police officer?! I'm even surprised how he has been able to keep Milo alive when he is never home, always working.
❄️ I'm loving how Liam is sulking about everything going on in that small-town. But at the same time, he will do his best to protect Hannah.
❄️ I have a feeling Quinn is going to be able to let the people of Fall Creek see that the militia is not there for their benefit.
❄️ The Sinclair's are a bunch of greedy but stupid people 😂 how the hell Julian thought his magnificent plan was going to work?
❄️ Fall Creek will have to use their brains—if they have one—and protect themselves. How they thought the militia and Rosamond really care for them? Is beyond me.
❄️ Could it be possible to drop a bomb or just a big earthquake to disappear Winter Haven. What a bunch of entitled people!

I hope the next book stays as good and entertaining for me.

[Olivia]

The Edge of Collapse series continues to offer characters to root for, fast-paced plot, inevitable clashes between different camps, and a whole lot of survival. Post-apocalyptic entertainment at its best.

[Tobias Poulsen]

Two things I really dislike about this series:
1. Sooo much talk about feelings. I get it, it builds character and depth. But this is simply too much for me.
2. So many "how do I prolong this scene needlessly?". Something like "she lunged the knife at his heart, but he dodged last minute. She tried again, but slipped. She tried again, but his coat was too thick. She tried again but it was a dream. Etc. etc.".

[Sarah Patton]

Great follow up

This was a great follow up to the third book in the series building up to the final act. Since this book was written during a real-time crisis, there are a lot of emotions that we can all relate to. In addition, lots of tips and tricks thrown in that will perhaps benefit who desire to not be caught unawares. I do have mixed emotions about the turn some of characters have taken but am hopeful they will overcome their flaws and do the right thing in the end. However, I am still firmly and will always be on team Hannah/Liam....I can't wait to see how the story ends.

[Daniel Ray]

Day 20 through day 40 or so of the apocalypse. Hanna is growing stronger after the torture and escape. The action moves from the cold wilderness to Hanna’s hometown. Hanna and Noah are reunited, but Hanna has given birth to Pike’s child and Noah has a problem with it. And Hanna has brought back her savior, Liam, adding jealousy to the mix. Noah is the police chief but Pike’s evil mother controls the town and its militia. The townspeople including Hanna are not safe. And Noah is a step behind. Well written and lots of action but the story does move along slow to middling.

[Christina Botchway]

High Intensity, great storytelling!!!

What a ride. This had me on the edge of my seat throughout. I can’t get enough of the awesome duo, Liam and Hannah. Or should I say trio with Ghost. In the first book I didn’t really like what I heard of Noah. He kind of redeemed himself in the second book but now all I can say is that maybe my first impressions weren’t all that off. It was so cathartic with what happened to you know who! This series is truly amazing. I haven’t been so into a series for a long time. Usually by book three I’m done with the characters and really just want it all to end. Not with this one though. Can’t wait for more and more. I know I’m being greedy but you can never have too much of a good thing right?

[chris]

I'm just staying mostly for the dog at this point.

[Candy]

This series is so addictive and the story keeps getting better and better! As the apocalypse is continuing we FINALLY get some satisfying karma for Pike!!! And my girl Hannah just gets stronger and stronger! Looking forward to continuing on.

[Tom G. Lapham]

The Edge of Amazing

Kyla only gets better. She keeps you guessing from page to page, paragraph to paragraph, word to word!
Her ability to flawlessly move from one crisis to another (usually worse) crisis w/o losing the reader is truly “Amazing!”. It is so easy to lose track or not care about the outcome unless the author is flawless in dragging the reader in and clamping on to ones thought process! There has to be more going on then pure horror to be truly frightening.
Again Kyla manages to keep the overall feel of the story somewhat “light” while at the same time creating characters and situations that will scare you to the edge of death! The event in the shop with Quinn and DeSota was perfectly perfectly horrific!
Try to think about the hidden message Rosalind was giving to Noah, the viciousness of it...while at the same time smashing not just a peanut butter cookie in ones mouth but a peanut butter cookie with peanut butter morsels!
The description of the simple cookie takes you one place while the sermon from Rosalind puts a lump in your stomach! ! So delightfully scary... So AMAZING! .
Moving on to DEFIANCE!

[Laura]

I'm so locked into this now that all the characters are converging

[Corrie Brown]

Noah is as useless a dry, burnt noodle.

[Cath]

This is book four of the Edge of Collapse series and the author is just producing better and better books as the series progresses. This is the best book in the series so far and was just WOW! It continues with Hannah, Liam, Ghost and baby Charlotte’s struggle to trek to Fall Creek, her previous home town. Hannah was taken captive by a man called Pike and held for five years, until an EMP struck and her prison door’s electronic lock failed. She has been beaten, tortured, starved and used as his sex toy for all these years, and was left as just a shadow of her former self and heavily pregnant. Now she, Liam and her dog Ghost, had to stop during a bad storm as she gave birth to Charlotte. Pike had been tracking them and trying to get Hannah back and they thought he had finally been killed. Nothing is quite that easy though!

Back in Fall Creek, matters are about to get worse, as Rosamond Sinclair controls the town with the militia she called in, run by her cousin Sutter. Fifty fully armed and trained men are now policing the town and have full control over food distribution and justice, often quickly and viciously given out. Rosamond promoted Noah Sheridan, Hannah’s husband and father of their son Milo, to Sheriff after the previous sheriff disappeared suddenly one day. Anyone that dissents with Rosamond’s plans is dealt with swiftly by her militia and there have been a number of occurrences in the town that have caused huge numbers of deaths and left many desperate not to make waves, to stay under the radar and just survive. Noah depends on Rosamond and the militia to find Milo’s medication, which is the only thing that keeps him alive. Some in town are not happy with how the town is being managed and soon matters will come to a head. But it will bring danger to all.

There is no electricity or comforts that modern life has made commonplace for most, and some are really struggling to make the changes to cope with all the change. Most of the homes aren’t made for life without heating or open fires and no running water, so many are being housed in close quarters in the local school building and tempers are fraying. Rosamond and her favoured people are comfortable in cabins in the wealthy Winter Haven settlement just outside of town, where they have solar power, generators and running water. Life is almost like normal there.

Hannah is almost home, but it won’t be anything like she expected it to be. She has gone through hell over the last five years and in the time since the EMP strike, she has had to dig deep to gain back her strength and also to survive the harsh conditions she has been travelling through. Many of her friends and neighbours in Fall Creek are dead or living in difficult situations and no one is as friendly as they used to be. Most are out for themselves and want to protect their own families first and foremost. Her return will be a shock for all, especially for her husband Noah, as well as those who won’t want to believe who was actually responsible for her captivity and this will mean more danger for her and those she loves.

This review has been written to try and not give away any spoilers about things that happen in the book and so issues have only been widely discussed above. This book is definitely the best in the series so far. There is lots happening to all the keys characters in the story and matters are coming to a head in so many different ways. Life is hard now for all those who have made it through the initial chaos of the EMP strike and the continuing severe winter weather hampering efforts for any sort of subsistence living for most. The EMP was so sudden that 99% of the town residents were completely unprepared for what was to come. One of my other favourite characters is Quinn’s grandmother, whose husband was a prepper and taught her lots of what she needs to survive and she is passing this on to her granddaughter. Something many of us may have wished for, as the pandemic hit us all, with no warning and vast changes to how we live.

Hannah and Liam are great characters, both have been damaged deeply in the recent past, but now have a shared goal to reach, to get Hannah home to her husband and son. They have both become stronger as they have travelled, having to deal with many attacks and struggles just to make it, but with the help of Ghost, the dog Hannah rescued from Pike’s hideaway which had been equally mistreated by Pike, they have a dogged protector to help them. The relationship between Milo and Quinn has just gotten stronger after the massacre at the church and they are a great pair to follow along. Milo has the stubborn defiance of his mother and wants the justice and equal treatment of others that his father has taught him. Another fantastic read in this series and I can’t wait for the next book which will bring about the end of the series. I will be sad to see it end, but the characters and circumstances will live on in my memories. Certainly an author to follow and a series to read, as well as their other series’. I received an ARC copy of this book from the author and I have freely given my own opinion of the book above.

[Brittany]

5 Stars ✨

Best of the series so far!

[Deb]

Great

I've been reading this series and it's absolutely addicting. No electricity, cars don't run , the things that we take for granted stripped away. Freezing temperatures, only survival is everyone's goal. Food is very hard to come by, and chaos and violence. There's conspiracy and the threatening militia. Which country is truly responsible is unknown.

I highly recommend this series.

[Jada]

Really enjoyed this one! I’m nervous to see how it all ends😅

[Donna]

Genres: Dystopia/Sci-fi

This is book #4 in the Edge of Collapse series I couldn't put this one down and I was hanging on every word. I love it when a book can sweep me away like that.

The characters are all unique but they all have need for survival in common. It was interesting to see how the author explored the gray area where we find out how far people will go and what lines they are willing to cross to protect and feed their families/communities.

When I finished this one I immediately picked up book #5. SO 4 stars.

[Elena Gerrald]

Audiobook 🎧

[BookNightOwl]

I love that this apocalyptic story takes place in Michigan because I live in Michigan and it makes me think what if something like this was to happen. Where would I go to Survive or would I stay in my home. Michigan has long winters and this is when this story takes place. What a fantastic series so far.

[LISA]

Another excellent, action-packed ride is delivered in this fourth installment of the series. This one came close to a five-star rating—so close! I’m hoping Book 5 will be even better, as each book has definitely improved as the series has gone along. These books are filled with well-developed characters and strong, brave, resilient women.

[~Bonnie~]

I love everything about this series, the story keeps getting better with each book. Well I love everything about this series except for one thing. For some reason in each book there is at least one pretty big editing issue. Big enough that it takes me out of the story, and I hate that. In my copy of this book, without giving any spoilers, chapter 35 is a different version of what happened in chapter 34. I thought at first I'd lost my mind. Or maybe it was part of the story. (It wasn't) And what's really bad is that chapter 34 was a very pivotal chapter. So it was pretty disappointing to me that the editors didn't pick up on this huge mistake. Like I said, there were other issues, either small or large, in the previous 3 books as well, but I won't go into all that. This is why I give these books only 4 stars. Otherwise I highly recommend this series.

[Sophie Leadbetter]

Looooved this. Love Hannah and Liam’s character development but wtf is happening to Noah?!

[Elisabeth Nadler]

This rating is for the audiobook. 4.5 rounded up. As I've mentioned about the others, the narrator is VERY good at smoothing out what bothers me in written format. (mainly the short sentences)

Good stuff:
Liam is my favorite. Hands down.
Hannah has grown on me.
Character development all around has greatly improved.
Loved the fight scenes. (Surprise, surprise, I'm a huge fan of descriptive violence, haha!)

Couple "meh" things:
There's more words than just "plumes" when describing what a dog's tail does.
Handful of other repetitive words, but at least hearts aren't always "bucking" anymore!
(Of course, I have the same overuse-word problem... just ask my readers about the word "wordlessly" in my earlier books!)
Some things are pretty predictable, but it's still a very entertaining story!

There are a few other things that would bother me if I were reading the physical/kindle book, but as aforementioned, this is a great listen for my busy days! And again... I love the range of emotions the narrator delivers.

[Angela]

Powerful. Uncomfortable. Impossible to put down.

This is the book where the series stops warming up and fully locks in.

The story doesn’t change the premise, it deepens it.
Three weeks after the grid collapse, survival is no longer about improvising.
It’s about endurance.
About choices that don’t come with clean hands.
About how far you’re willing to go when winter is brutal, food is gone, and the people you love are the only line that still matters.

What hit me hardest here is the moral pressure.
Not the action, though it’s relentless, but the quiet moments where characters cross lines they once swore they never would.
Not because they’re cruel.
Because they’re human.
Because collapse strips away comfort, not conscience… and then forces conscience to adapt or break.

The cold is almost a character of its own.
The scarcity is constant.
There’s no pause, no safety net, no illusion that help is coming.
And yet... this book isn’t hopeless.
It’s raw, tense, and deeply grounded in the psychology of survival.

Thi is where the story stops being just about surviving the end of the world…
and becomes about who you are after the world ends.

[Lisa]

What would you do to survive in a world of anarchy? Would you turn a blind eye to atrocities to your community and neighbours at a chance for your own survival? Would you stray from your own morals to keep your family alive....

I read this in a day. I just couldn't put it down!
I don't care what anyone thinks but GHOST is the REAL HERO of this whole series. This dog has single handedly saved Liam and Hannah from death's door multiple times already. He protects his flock, he loves snow and he has the attitude of a humble know it all. Give him all the Jerky!
Oh and Noah is a pansy. Man up shitbag.

[Dinah Lynn]

The series keeps progressing nicely . . . I’m ready for the next book.