Ugh. I wanted to hate this book. I wanted to hate this book soooo badly, but I ended up loving it. First off, let me just explain to you why I so desperately wanted to hate it!
Okay, so Survivors is the new series written by "Erin Hunter". Why the quotation marks you ask? Well the original four Erins have nothing to do with it! This pisses me off. Yes--HarperCollins does have rights to the name "Erin Hunter" but the truth is that the four Hunters have worked hard to earn their title. They were going to stop Warriors after The Last Hope but HarperCollins forced them to write the fifth series Dawn of the Clans.
Now, Survivors is written by these "fake" Erins. On forums.warrriorcats.com, there was a vote for the cover of Survivors - Book 1: The Empty City. I am glad that the cover was in a different format than the Warriors and Seekers books. These books do not say "Erin Hunter" anywhere. And yes, I know, Erin Hunter is on the cover for the author, but it is NOT ERIN STYLE AT ALL!
1. The Prologue. Yes there are prologues in the Warriors but not the Seekers series. However, one tell-tale Erin Hunter trait is that she never names the characters unless another character says their name. The first sentence is: "Yap wriggled, yawning, and gave a small excited whimper." In true Erin Hunter style, they would have said: "A small, newborn puppy..." or something like that.
2. The format. These books are double-spaced. When novels are double-spaced it screams either children's books or laziness. Yes, this is a children's novel to some extent, but teens and young adults read these books too. I am living proof of that. These books are in the Children's section, yes, but they are written like novels you would find on the #1 Bestseller list... Well Warriors and Seekers were. I haven't read Survivors yet, but I am skeptical.
3. The cover. I know that it was voted to be different which I am glad for. However, if HarperCollins truly wanted it to look "Erin Hunter"-like, they would have kept to the style of the other series.
By doing this and hiring new writers and forcing authors to write more because they own their combined name is just selfish. They just want money and they have basically said that the four Erins are replaceable. This is outrage. Some people might not care who writes the books, but I do.
I am going to read Survivors, but I will never look at HarperCollins the same way again, and will never have respect for them.
Okay, so, yes, I was well prepared to nit-pick the s**t out of this book because I was so pissed off at HarperCollins... However, I loved the story.
So The Empty City is about when an earthquake (I think) ends up destroying a city. All of the people have apparently died off from injury, radiation, disease, or have fled, many leaving their dogs behind. Lucky was in a Trap House, which I guess is comparable to an animal control kennel, or something like that, when the "Big Growl" strikes. Lucky's cage toppels over and he and his friend Sweet escape the Trap House.
The pair set off into the city and try to fend for themselves. Lucky is what they call a "Lone Dog". He survives on his own and doesn't need to rely on anyone, and doesn't want anyone to rely on him. Sweet, however, is not like that. She is a Pack Dog through and through and ends up leaving Lucky to find a pack.
Lucky then faces a series of challenges trying to survive on his own in the city until he nearly gets attacked by a pack of foxes. Just when all hope seems to be lost, however, Lucky's litter-sister, Bella (formerly Squeak) and her Pack come to the rescue. Lucky, however, soon ends up realizing that Bella and her Pack are Leashed Dogs, or pets. They are waiting for their longpaws (humans) to return to them, even though it is clear that they have left.
After some thorough convincing and some frightening events, Lucky leads the strange Pack into the wilderness and teach them to survive on their own.
Honestly, I really did not hate this book. I was so prepared to, but just couldn't. The characters were well-structed and I liked the little sibling-rivalry between Lucky and Bella. I have my own opinions about Bella, but I won't bore you with my rants since I've already seemed to have ranted enough in this review. I liked that the author made each character have a unique talent that helped them out in the long run, and they were all able to work together.
I didn't like the ending though. I hate cliff-hangers especially when he have to wait a year for the sequel. :( But, I can't say anything worse about it than I already have. All of my gripes are with HarperCollins, not the author herself.
One thing that made me laugh is that ANYONE who has read the Warriors books and possibly even the Seekers books is that the writers make A LOT of mistakes! My English teacher would give out extra credit for each mistake we brought in from a published work, and I would just bring in my stack of Warriors books and boost up my grade by a whole letter! However, I didn't see any mistakes in Survivors, which is always nice.