Ashes by Ilsa Bick

It is one of our fears in our lives today. An electromagnetic pulse flashes across the sky and our world as we know it comes crashing to an end. Ilsa J. Bick takes us on a journey with young Alex and her personal demons as she fights for survival in this dangerously realistic and frightening new novel.

As for the people who survive, it is a question of who can Alex trust and who is infected. Alex puts her guarded trust in Tom, a soldier and a young orphan, Ellie. Even of them, she is wary and uncertain.

This novel is terrifying both in its future implications for our own society but for personal issues that arise when trust is no longer an option at any cost. This is not your ordinary end of the world story. It gives the reader a look into the minds of the survivors and how living after the devastation affects them. Bick has created deep and well defined characters.

I am not a zombie lover. I shy away from the dead walking. I did however, enjoy this book. I found it had more to offer than your typical “shoot ‘em in the head and run” (don’t forget to double tap) mentality. I did enjoy this book. It is violent, gory in parts and thrills around every corner, my kind of book.

About the Author

Ilsa J. Bick is a child psychiatrist, as well as a film scholar, former Air Force major, and now a full-time author. Her critically acclaimed first YA novel, Draw the Dark, won the 2011 Westchester Fiction Award and was named a Bank Street College 2011 Best Book. Ilsa currently lives with her family and several furry creatures in rural Wisconsin, near a Hebrew cemetery. One thing she loves about the neighbors: they’re very quiet and only come around for sugar once in a blue moon. You can visit her online at Ilsa Bick.


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