Year One

When Nora Roberts first spoke of writing a fantasy series I was immediately intrigued. I'm a huge lover of the fantasy genre and have been reading Nora Roberts books since I was fourteen years old. Nora Roberts is a prolific romance writer - one of the reigning queens of the genre - and also known for her ongoing sci-fi/detective In Death series that she writes under the pen name J.D.Robb. The one thing that both these genres (or at least the books that Nora Roberts writes in these genres) is that for the most part, the books in the fantasy and sci-fi/detective genre have a happy ever after, happy for now or a satisfactory ending (in that - the bad guy is captured and put away, etc). Whereas, in fantasy, as those who write and read the genre can tell you, not all fantasy books, especially epic fantasy books have happy endings. So I was very curious to see what Nora Roberts would do in the fantasy genre and how the story would play out and I was absolutely thrilled when I was given the chance to read and review an advanced copy of Year One. So what can I tell you about Year One? Any lovers of fantasy, dystopian fantasy, or paranormal romance/fantasy romance - read it! This book completely absorbed me and drew me in. I was hooked within the first few pages and stayed up reading way, way longer than I should have - ok - I admit it! - I maybe didn't sleep at all! - Mainly because I wanted to read just one more page, and then just one more, until the book was finished. I am, even now, still feeling the residual effects of a book hangover and am in that mental stage where I don't really want to read anything else yet but merely want to revel and think about the characters and world that I had just been immersed within. I am not going to tell you anything that happened in the book as I believe in keeping reviews as spoiler free as possible, but I will tell you that Year One , reads like many of Nora Roberts books. It has the same somewhat lyrical and poetic style of description and imagery as many of her previous works do. The characters and world come to vivid, beautiful life and you have the sense when you're reading - that even if you didn't know the authors name - you would still know that you were reading a Nora Roberts book. No one writes quite like Nora Roberts. What I loved the most about this book and the one thing that I am going to take away from it and think about; is that, even though this is a fantasy book, a fictional story, it gave me a sense of hope and reminded me that even in the darkest of times - you can find flashes of light, sparks of courage and bravery, little glimpses of the beauty and strength of the human spirit. Thank you to Hachette Australia and Netgalley for providing me with an arc of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book with its many ups and downs and surprises and I'm already eagerly awaiting the next book in the series. I can't wait to see what happens next and I highly recommend reading this book.

Rhianna Caley

Well if you think you know what you are getting into you being a Nora Roberts book you are wrong this is not her typical Romance or Mystery novel, it is a post-apocalyptic dystopian novel. It is so different from anything that Nora Roberts (JD Robb) has written before. The Doom is a deadly virus that causes people to die, over half the world’s population has died and the survivors that are immune to the virus find that they have powers that they did not have before. There are people who are now either faeries, elves or witches or have powers like telekinesis. The story starts off with patient zero on New Year's Eve in the Scottish countryside. He travels back home to America, the virus spreads like wildfire. We then follow the survivors through the first year. The main characters are Arlys a reporter, Jonah a paramedic, Lana a chef and Max a novelist. Oh, and a set of twins. There are many more characters in the book too. I won't go into any details of the story as I don’t want to give and spoilers away. I have to give credit where credit is due if Nora Roberts was not author of this book I doubt I would I picked it up but since she was I had to read this book. I will admit I do not read post-apocalyptic dystopian/fantasy novels. But I really did enjoy this book and I am looking forward to book two to see what happens with my favourite characters that I was rooting for throughout the book. I laughed, I cried, I even felt sick and was gagging at times with the characters. This book has it all, there is some romance and mystery, then there is the fantasy and magic. Could you survive The Doom? It is a question I asked myself after reading this book. I have to be honest, I think I would struggle to survive but I would give it my all like the characters and not give up easily. I would of course miss life’s luxuries. I would recommend this book with no hesitation. Thank you to Netgalley and Hachette Australia for this ARC in exchange for an open and honest review.

I enjoyed this Nora Roberts book, very different from anything of hers I have read in the past, but I can't wait for book 2. I loved how all the different threads weaved together and I enjoyed the majority of the characters, obviously you have the bad guys who we aren't meant to like. I thought the concept of different people getting 'gifts' or 'powers' was an interesting take on the normal dystopian story and made things interesting.

Claire Louisa Holderness