The Silo Series Boxed Set: Wool, Shift, Dust, and Silo Stories

by Hugh Howey

For the first time ever, The Silo Saga Omnibus brings together all of the work in Hugh Howey's ground-breaking, best-selling, acclaimed series, including the individual novels Wool, Shift, and Dust , as well as original essays by the author, and a bonus chapbook of short fiction, Silo Stories The remnants of humanity live underground in a vast silo. In this subterranean world, rules matter. Rules keep people alive. And no rule is more strictly enforced than to never speak of going outside. The punishment is exile and death. When the sheriff of the silo commits the ultimate sin, the most unlikely of heroes takes his place. Juliette, a mechanic from the down deep, who never met a machine she couldn’t fix nor a rule she wouldn’t break. What happens when a world built on rules is handed over to someone who sees no need for them? And what happens when a world broken to its core comes up against someone who won’t stop until things are set to right? Their world is about to fall. What—and who—will rise?

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Dystopia, Post Apocalyptic, Fantasy, Mystery, Thriller

1712 pages, Paperback

Published October 20, 2020

About the author

I'm the author of WOOL, a top 5 science fiction book on Amazon. I also wrote the Molly Fyde saga, a tale of a teenager from the 25th century who is repeatedly told that girls can't do certain things -- and then does them anyway.

A theme in my books is the celebration of overcoming odds and of not allowing the cruelty of the universe to change who you are in the process. Most of them are classified as science fiction, since they often take place in the future, but if you love great stories and memorable characters, you'll dig what you find here. I promise.

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Because it was easier grabbing one ebook instead of several, I read the Omnibus edition. So my impressions are broadly holistic of the entire series {Wool Omnibus, Shift, Dust and the Sil0̸ Stories In the Air, In the Mountain, and In the Woods}, and thus so are the annotations I made — which contain plenty o’ spoilers. Caveat lector.)

Wonderfully: This is quite a yarn. Set in the near future, Howey kills off most of humankind, leaving the remnant underground for quite a while. Most of them have no clue that their world is so limited. The characters are fleshed out thoughtfully (well, mostly) and the telling is fast-paced and riveting.

Sadly: The author originally self-published, and thus didn’t avail himself of the benefit of a professional scifi editor. That means there’s a lot that got left in which he probably may have been gently (or strenuously) encouraged to modify for the sake of plausibility.

My three-star evaluation is because I too often found myself grinding my teeth — some of those flaws relate to fundamental aspects of his story. And the same story probably could be told effectively with modification.

I understand the enthusiasm in the reviews, even if I personally feel the plaudits are somewhat excessive. The rest of this “review” consists of a spoiler examination of the flaws.

Oh, as far as I can tell, the Apple TV series manages to avoid many? most? all? of those problems, although quite possibly because it hasn’t yet been forced to reveal critical details.

The problems with plausibility begin early in the book. Holston is forced out of his silo as a cleaner, and sees a different world than he’d expected — a world of greenery and life. But minutes later, as he is dying, he is able to remove his helmet and sees the same dismal and lifeless world those inside the silo see. The difficulty here is that the green world was on a screen inside his helmet — but it doesn’t work that way. Our binocular vision demands two slightly different views of the outside world to create depth perception, and if we were given a single screen a few inches in front of our eyes, we’d quickly get a headache from being cross-eyes. This is why a Virtual Reality Headset have two screens for that stereoscopic perspective.

Perhaps this could be fixed through the Howey’s nanotechnology, but that magical technology wouldn’t fix the other problem here: that every human who is condemned to leave a silo sticks around to do “cleaning” instead of running for the hills.

In terms of the chronological narrative, flaws start before the silos are even built. We’re told it is 2049 — less than thirty years after it was first written. Howey was born in 1975, so probably remembers the technology of the mid 90’s, and should have had a better idea of how quickly tech changes.

Some technology doesn’t change fast enough:

In the 90’s we had cathode-ray tubes (the first flat-panel TV was released in 1997), but Donald is struggling with a desktop computer in 2049?

Later we’ll learn the mechanical level of a silo has an oil derrick in the lowest level (there are no oil reserves in Georgia) and a bunch of the machines use petroleum fuels, including a front-end loader belching a “charcoal geyser from its exhaust pipe”.

A lot of the emergency supplies are freeze-dried, but others are cans (with the Jolly Green Giant on them!), which are expected to last up to 500 years. Other supplies apparently include florescent light bulbs, which "flicker hesitantly" after a few decades of inactivity. So LEDs turn out to be a dead-end technology, eh?

Other technology changes too fast, and ultimately they create much larger problems with plausibility.

One is with psychology, and the monster problem is with the nanotechnology.

The reason there much be power-hungry servers in each silo [well, they don’t have to be in each silo, but putting them in the master-control Silo removes too much of the conflict] is because they are watching and listening to all the silo’s inhabitants, grading them individually and collectively for the survival quotient: only one silo will win the right to repopulate the world. But our understanding of human motivation is nowhere near achieving that level of prediction! Even the “truth detection” abilities involved in the master-control Silo’s interrogation of the IT leadership is absurd. We aren’t even close to the simpler of the two.

The ultimate problem is with nanotechnology. In 2049, we’re told Senator Thurman “doesn’t really age, you know”, because of his nano treatments. There’s already quite a bit of fiction that involves the nano scale, but the 2049 timeframe is even more laughably early than the psychology stuff. By then we’ll undoubtedly have learned better how to create more sophisticated nano stuff, but we probably will still be struggling to integrate disparate components. But Howey not only has nano machines, but those include very sophisticated AI software, able to read genetic code, repair multiple health problem, and cause a quite quick death. Beyond even that, they are self-replicating! That means that not only are these things able to harvest material from their environment, they can even fabricate the computers within. The “machines” we use just to create today’s scale chips are among the most staggeringly complicated things humanity creates. Per the Wikipedia page on “Fabs”:

❝Estimates put the cost of building a new fab at over one billion U.S. dollars with values as high as $3–4 billion not being uncommon. TSMC invested $9.3 billion in its Fab15 300 mm wafer manufacturing facility in Taiwan.❞

To illustrate how this messes with the story, if self-replicating technology was available, then creating the silos themselves would involve programming a single nano and dropping it at the site of the silo: it would use the soil and rock and whatnot to create trillions of replicas, all coordinating to spread out and down, and construct according to plan.

The Silo Omnibus includes the three-part short, Sil0̸ Stories, which contains an error so glaring that by itself it shows the need for an editor: The story involves people who learn of the main conspiracy and, not being among the selected Silo inhabitants, spend a fortune to hide themselves away in a Colorado mountain redoubt for the duration. But they realize they’ve made a mistake: the “duration” is five hundred years, not six months. Chaos ensues, but two of them are able to survive, and travel to Georgia to take vengeance on those who have created such horror. The problem is that the main storyline ends only 250 years or so into that 500, and yet the two Colorado people who survived are able to kill Juliette, who would have perished centuries earlier.

[Adam Diehm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Writing the review on the saga.

I love the world. The first book takes us on a bit of a tour, and has us wondering who the main characters may end up being. The fact that it initially was a set of short stories explains that a bit.

That setup really helps set the stage, and then get us wondering why we're here.

Shift then comes in and gives us the background, while Dust rolls the two together as we draw to a conclusion.

I was left a little wanting at the end...
- What about Silo 40 - are they there? Did they get out? Are they out in the world?
- My expectation is that a solid half of the silos are still running at the time of the book ending... what about other silos? Do they get released? What happens to silos after Silo 1 goes down.. computer systems flake out? Nobody on the other end of the line for IT... etc.

I can imagine that this is why Mr. Howey opens the world up to other writers - I have not read the sil0 stories yet, maybe some of that is in there before other authors weigh in.

Really glad I read the series - great combination of writing talent and a great world!

[pennyg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent sci-fi novels with an original and intriguing premise; inhabitants of a failing dangerous planet required to live for generations in underground silos. Of course there is more to the story. It's divided into three books, Wool, Shift, and Dust. Each around 500-600 pages filed with Interesting characters, Intrigue, and an extremely intricate world.

The first and the last book are their present day, the middle book a prequel of sorts. I read these in the order they were presented but if I had it to do all over I would read the prequel, Shift, first. It is probably the least interesting of the three books but necessary to understand the beginning and motivations of the other two books.

My box set includes the three books and a short story all well written and highly original although quite detailed and intricate. The first book Wool was purportedly written while the author was a book seller writing while on his lunch breaks and self published through Amazon Kindle. I think it is safe to say he no longer requires the service of Amazon Kindle self-publishing.

[Rachel DeFriez · Rating 4 out of 5]

WOOL rates a 5 star. The characters are well-developed and very engaging. The premise of post-apocalyptic life in a silo meant to preserve humanity as seeds for the future of the race captures the imagination, even if the lack of a realistic scale of things challenges belief. The second story SHIFT rates a 3 because it basically spirals into a huge, less-engaging backstory of the anti-hero. DUST finishes out the first story, meanders a bit, but I personally felt the intriguing relationship plot lines were lost and lamented the somewhat anticlimactic, unsatisfying ending.

[Andrew B · Rating 4 out of 5]

** 4.4 Stars out of 5 Stars **

[Milo Axelrod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wildly good scifi, these have stuck with me for nearly 10 years as a frankly traumatic experience that I do not at all regret. They had me fascinated, horrified, rejoicing, unable to put them down, and at one point laying on the floor in my dorm hallway crying. (This was back in 2012 when they first came out and the memories are clear as day.) Absolutely incredible storytelling and a truly gripping slow reveal of this world Howey has built. For me, this was One Of Those Books.

There were definitely slower parts that I pushed through and characters that I didn't find particularly compelling, but all was intentional and deeply worth it.

Tasting notes include scifi, politics, human nature, and apocalypse, evoking feelings of desperation, mystery, empowerment, and that one scene from Watership Down that I will never forget in my entire life.

[Bernard Jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely fantastic and brilliant. Again!

I loved paperback editions I’ve read seven-and-a-half years ago, and now I even more love The Silo Saga Omnibus: Wool, Shift, Dust, and Silo Stories.

One of the best dystopian series ever written, which will also remain one of the best dystopian series ever written for a long time.

Except, when I look at it seven years later, it loses its dystopian, futuristic touch as our reality changes its face with the first ticks of dystopia and the future is closing in on us with its merciless grip FAST.

Hugh Howey, how many of us will survive in this real world?

Read my old review here.

[Phillip Murrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an amazing series, especially the final entry! I have little to complain about. In fact, my biggest gripe is probably how everyone calls them "clips" instead of "magazines." All those military men would have known better. I digress. Poor research on military jargon is not enough to make me speak ill of this book series. I can't wait to watch the show now, and I hope it stays true to what was written on the pages gifted to us by Mr. Howey.

[Coreena · Rating 1 out of 5]

The ultimate guide in telling, not showing.

This was the most tedious epic I have ever come across. 1800 pages of text for 100 pages of plot. I know I'm in the EXTREME minority on this one, but I do not get it. Kudos though to the writers of the tv show for salvaging something compelling out of... this.

[Nikki · Rating 5 out of 5]

I got this omnibus as a steal to revisit the series with show coming out. I think I like it more now with what Ive learned in the last ten years about the world? Absolutely believeable that our "leaders" would do something like this.

I also loved the addition of the short stories at the end. I was wondering if there was any chance of anyone else making it so that got addressed plus a little more revisiting of 17/18. The end of Dust gave more than I remember too so not sure if that was added or if my memory was bad. I'd love to hear more what happened in Colorado!

I've heard he has an idea for another trilogy. I hope it's about what happened in the 40s. So much of that was a mystery and definitely so much potential to explore there.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an incredible journey. I picked this up because I watched the TV series and was intrigued. The books are a bit different from the TV series, but alike enough. They are also better and more in depth, as books tend to be.

Bottom line: I could not put this down. I raced through all three books. I laughed, cried, got angry, and cried again. Some parallels to the world as it is today were noted. The wealthy and powerful will always do what's best for them, and don't give a damn about the rest of us.

PS Steve Zahn as Solo in the TV series is great casting. I kept reading his words in Steve's voice.

[Annie Em · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book series examining morality, technological hubris, and human nature in a post apocalyptic world. I greatly appreciated how the author paced the book. Some of reveals I was able to piece together but the whole came together beautifully so as to allow the reader to understand the characters and their flaws (and moral compasses) as unfolding layers. Thought provoking, engaging, and very well written.

[Sandeep · Rating 5 out of 5]

An epic tale

I thoroughly enjoyed this three book series. Needed to take a break between the three to do some lighter reading because of the intensity the entire series.
Also the two short stories at the end were a nice Honu

[Tony Gangi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly monumental feat. The characters are alive here and grasping for truths and life equally. The pacing in exquisite and the pedal stays mashed to the floor through all three of these deliriously engrossing sci-fi epics.

[Dennis Lussier · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this series. Book 1 was a ton of fun, and there’s and amazing Apple TV series that paints a beautiful image of the silo and covers about the first half of that book. Book 2 is a prequel and is probably my favorite of the series. Three takes a minute to get into but closes a bunch of loops. If you’re into sci fi at all this is a great series to read!

[Ondřej Plachý · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun fast paced some logical flaws but hey I don't read this for the hard scifi experience

[Kryptomite · Rating 4 out of 5]

I started reading this after watching the TV show, and was surprised that although the book and show are largely the same, they also differ in many details. I've only read wool so far, and I feel both had details they did better. Wool, however, did end rather abruptly, and left me a little surprised, without a few answers I was seeking.

[Kate K · Rating 4 out of 5]

The premise and world is super captivating- a society living in an underground bunker, terrified of the outside world, with no knowledge of how they got into the bunkers. I started reading after really enjoying the TV series (the first season of which covers about half of the first book). My favorite book is the second, Shift.

The omnibus also contains additional essays by the author after each of the “main” sections which added a lot to my appreciation of the work.

The writing is good, but not great.

Dust I found the hardest to get through - it felt rushed, like the author was taking the material to a neat ending faster than it wanted to go.


Wool - 3.5 / 5
Shift - 4/5
Dust- 3.5/5
Short Stories- 4/5

[Federico De Obeso · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excelente manera de concluir la trilogía.
Recomendable a todos los que gusten de leer ficción.

[Pedro · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed season one on tv & decided to take the plunge to learn more. The read is about a society who live underground with no knowledge of their deeper history, & who are subject to a set of rules and laws. Various folk seek to break free of the cycle, which causes consequences.

Book two provides background to book one, while book three ties together all three. I felt the read was inflated & could have been much shorter. There is a lot of waffle. However, I liked the premise but feel any reader can halt at book one. Sometimes it's good to leave at a cliff hangar.

[Charles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written, solid apocalypse fiction. I probably could have lived with it being about 1/3rd the length. Does a much better job of setting up the mystery than solving it - but overall still a solid read.

[Shaila B · Rating 3 out of 5]

First book: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Second book: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Third book: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Short stories: what the heck?!

[Jennifer Gattis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the storyline of the books so much better than where the show is going.

[Noor Al-Shanti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently watched season 2 of the Silo TV show and with that cliffhanger ending, I found myself wanting to re-read these books. Just like the first time I read them, I found myself compelled to read on; this is a true page-turner! And just like the first time I read them, I thoroughly enjoyed this series. I can't wait to see how some of these things are going to be adapted for TV in future seasons.

Wool, the first book in the trilogy, took 2 seasons to adapt. There were some logical changes to it that make sense for TV, especially in season 2/the second half of the book, as the writing in the books is very internal with the characters thoughts, worries, and struggled forming the main meat of the books. The TV show obviously had to be adapted so that a lot of that internal stuff could be presented better through the audiovisual medium. Also, since the books were written in like 2012 the technology saw a bit of an update to make it fit the times a bit better, with an AI now featuring in place of the radio communication from the books. Both Wool and these first 2 seasons of the show were excellent, each in their own way.

The second book, Shift, switched focus completely to go back in time and show us some of the backstory behind how the world reached the post-apocalyptic state that we saw in the first book. The author mentions in the end notes that he appreciated the freedom self-publishing gave him to explore something that he didn't think would really work in traditional publishing. It certainly wasn't the follow-up that I expected, but I also really enjoyed it. There were a lot of interesting moments as we saw Donald struggle with his position, his choices, and the choices others have made for him. It was definitely an interesting ride learning about this world and uncovering its secrets with him. And by the end of this book we circle back to the end point of book 1/the first series and reconnect with Jules in the final scene.

That final scene of the middle book had me very excited for book 3. Dust brings us back to Silo 18 and Jules and brings all the different storylines together. I did enjoy this book, but there was a point for each of the characters where it really diverged from my expectations and I felt a bit disappointed by how things played out. I still enjoyed it, but I just felt that some things I would have wanted to see were skipped over while other things I had zero interest in were randomly focused on. There was a also, along with the hope which is definitely there, a lot of... nihilism mixed in which got me thinking, but sort of annoyed me. The ending was still great, in my opinion, but I am really hoping we see more of some of the character that the TV show made me fall in love with which were actually just minor characters in the books!

I also think this series - and it's page-turner quality - relied a lot on "the world is not as it seems" type of reveals (kind of like Attack on Titan in a way) and that can be extremely hard to bring together at the end in a satisfying way, because it's almost like the author has to keep blowing the minds of the readers and shocking them with new information that makes them rethink everything, but... that can get kind of tiring and there's a danger of new reveals kind of cheapening some of the previous ones. It only really happened a tiny bit here (only when it came to Anna and some of Thurman's motivations, etc) but I think for me that tiny bit was enough to dock a star from an otherwise spectacular series.

I may end up doing a spoiler-filled blog post that focuses on some of these complaints (and the Attack on Titan comparison) later, but I wanted to try and keep my review spoiler-free and focus on the overall experience which was thoroughly enjoyable.

[Steve Solnick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was drawn to this book as a result of the AppleTV+ series. And, honestly, I think the series is better.

Howey's world building is excellent, though uneven. Certain themes are more prominent in some books than others. Book 2 (Shift) has some interesting elements about the economy of the Silo (division of labor and monopolies on trades) that don't feature later, and Book 3 (Dust) introduces a religious sect that comes and goes quickly, leaving little trace. On the other hand, Howey spends a lot of time describing plumbing.

While I read the full trilogy in one continuous run, I grew less fond of it as the exercise continued. Wool introduced some great elements of these worlds, but then Shift is one very long, often repetitive flashback that ends in the same place Wool does. We meet a compelling character (Jules) in Wool and leave her for a full book. When we recover her in Dust, she seems diminished. Instead, we track the revolts in Silo 17 and in 18, and maybe in 12 and maybe 40 and it all runs together.

Most disappointing, however, the characters feel two-dimensional, or even less developed than that. There are heroes, victims and evil geniuses. How does Senator Thurman manage to convince the entire US military to - what? - destroy the world? The secret of the nanobot timebombs in everyone's bloodstream never gets out? It's almost Thanos-level villainy.

Juliet is less compelling than her character in the TV series, Donald is annoying, Lucas is wimpy, Silo is sainted, most everyone else is interchangeable. On the whole, it's impressive exercise in world-building, with an increasingly implausible plot, and unconvincing characters. I have high hopes for the series, but the books disappointed.

Bonus note - the full trilogy edition contains 3 Silo Stories. They are worth a read as they fill out some of the details of what happened to end the world. However, as another reviewer here has astutely pointed out, they follow an inconsistent timeline. Survivors off the main plot line emerge from a mountainside after 500 years, find Juliette and murder her. But Silo 18 emerges to the outside just 250 years after the end of the world and is murdered 6 years later. So, that's a temporal problem.

[Matt Westover · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather lengthy endeavor as a collection of collections of stories.

Overall I'd call this saga good. Very well written, with lots of highs and lows along the way. Some very unique choices along the way for the narrative but overall a good Fallout Vaultec Silo collection.

Book by book:

Wool: 5/5 stars. While obviously starting as a short story the main ride of the overall plot for the saga picks up with Juliette. The trickle of info about the silos was great, lots of suspense as the truth was slowly revealed. The ending is very abrupt but given the amazing ride to that point, it is suitable.

Shift: 4/5 stars. It was a bold choice to make the middle section of this saga primarily a long flashback sequence. The twist of the first section of this was obvious, but not so in your face, just trusting you to pick it up. The middle section wavered a bit, though provided an interesting connection to the short story that kicked off the saga in the first place. The last section's "twist" was rather unexpected as it only caught up with the end of Wool in the last pages of the book.

Dust: 3/5 stars. Connecting both Wool and Shift into one last push worked pretty well. Introduction and PoVs of new characters felt pretty forced in. The inclusion of an out of nowhere cult was a bit much and the return of Thurman really seemed to be retconning the end of Shift just for the sake of having stuff happen.

Overall, a very enjoyable read. The writing was superb even if most of the characters rang a bit flat. Nothing mind-melting but something I would recommend people check out if they are interested in the whole post-apocalyptic survival thing.

[Moorland Streams · Rating 2 out of 5]

2/5 — Great world, but the TV series nailed the storytelling.

Perhaps unpopular opinion but I prefer the "Silo" TV adaptation over the books.

Hugh Howey’s world-building is undeniably brilliant — the silo system, the fear of the outside, the control mechanisms, it’s very thought-provoking. But for me, the "trilogy's structure" works against the emotional depth it could have had. "Wool" starts strong with Juliette, but "Shift" derails that momentum with a backstory that gives too much away, too soon. I want Dust to be the core book that made everything come together, instead of that slow reveal through all three books.

I wanted a version of this story that felt more like the show:

* Juliette front and centre
*Mystery revealed slowly
*Less emphasis on systems, more on characters finding each other

If I could rewrite the trilogy:

- *Wool* would focus only on Juliette’s journey, letting the secrets unravel gradually.
- *Shift* would be about Solo and the children, and their way to silo 18, not cryosleepers and bureaucrats.
- *Dust* would be the whole backstory, bureaucracy, cryosleep, etc. It should have been the book that brought everything together.

All that said, I’m glad I read it. It’s a fascinating perspective. I only wish the books had built the story more like the series has done.

The TV series is a 4/5 so far. They revealed too much in the last episode. It should have ended with Juliette in the fire chamber with Bernard.

Follow me on Medium where I post poems, flash fiction, and a weekly blog about my writing, what I read and my thoughts in general.

https://medium.com/@moorlandstreams

[Loretta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I almost gave up on this after the first few chapters of Wool. My current state of mind wanted something hopeful and this was bleak. I decided to power through and ended up devouring all 3 books over the next week (I was on vacation, okay?). Yes, there is a lot of bleakness in these books. Life can be bleak and our best intentions can lead us into chaos. Life can also hold hope in the midst of the bleakness.

My oldest asked me 'what are they about?' when I was trying to explain why she should read them. It's hard to say very much without giving away some key plot points. Perhaps the best I can say is 'post-apocalyptic people struggle with questions of right and wrong. Is it our moral compass that makes a thing right, or the later consequences? Can we do a right thing for the wrong reasons, or a wrong thing for the right reasons? What, exactly, do we owe to others?' All of this plays out against some intriguing characters and a wonderfully detailed world. (I swear I could feel the damp and the drip in the Deeps, feel the rattle of machinery, smell the plants in the Mids.)

Wool is, in my opinion, the best of the three and the most detailed. I think the series benefits from being combined into one massive omnibus; I think my attention might have lagged if I had waited to read Shift and Dust.

[Meaghan Mains · Rating 5 out of 5]

You follow the story of your main cast as they try to navigate the complex world of taboo, the old ways, and the new generation, who are seeking change. The older generation is set in their ways, believing that you shouldn’t fix what isn’t broken. Others, however, think that is it time to move things along and make a better life for themselves and the future members of the silo. A revolution might be brewing… But how can one accomplish a revolution from hundreds of stories deep? The hopeful people, the optimistic ones believe that their only escape is to venture outside of the silo.

The Silo series is a gripping story for anyone who likes science fiction stories, but more importantly, those set in a post-apocalyptic world. There are no fancy sci-fi technology or references; it’s all about humans experiencing a confined space, and being shown the classic forbidden fruit, which is – as usual – oh so tempting.

I would highly recommend this series to anyone who is looking to jump into a great new sci-fi epic, and who wants to feel the characters’ liberation and the taste of human hope, optimism, and desperation to survive.

Read the full review on Fully-Booked!.

[Quinn Modrak · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wool: 3.5 stars. Beginning is a little slow, probably because it was a short story first then was added on to again and again. I watched season 1 of the show before reading this, so I had a general idea of how the book was going to go. The show had more interesting stuff going on, so comparing the two may not be completely fair, but hard not to compare them. I think if the author started it as a novel first it would have been better. Definitely worth reading if you're going to read the whole trilogy.

Shift: 4.5 stars. Ideas throughout the book are more detailed and things are set up earlier since it's not starting as a short story. After finishing it I couldn't wait to see what book 3 had in store.

Dust: 4.0 stars. It was pretty good but I felt like it was kinda missing something to bring it all home. Like it's a nicely wrapped present but it's missing the bow on top. Like one last conversation between Thurman and Donald, when he realizes what is about to happen.

Overall a really good trilogy, interesting world building and characters. A lot of potential left if the author ever wanted to revisit the world.