4.5 stars. I have NOT read the "End of the World" series ... started with this one. It's on KindleUnlimited. Audio is not included, but it is discounted, and I went ahead and paid the $2 to get audio. I liked the audio format here, with the female and male narrators, not just switching chapters, but voicing ALL the men/women (even when the other is doing the main narration). It's nice not to have voice confusion.

I'd liked the first book, and this picks up where the first one left off. I think maybe I liked this book more, as we are already totally set up in the situation, we care about the characters, etc ... no learning curve. 500+ pages, but it went quite quickly.

Like book one, I really enjoyed the continued "Word of the Day" ... I'm always attempting to highlight and look up the meaning of any words I don't really know, so there are a TON (there were even some that were just used in the author's writing, NOT in the competition between Sylvie and Eric ...like "hectoring" and "buildering" I thought "bouldering" which it is related to, but free climbing a building rather than boulders).

There were several spots where I would laugh out loud at the conversations between characters. This is in present tense ... which I dislike. I don't think I even realized it was though (just as I was looking back on the Kindle copy) and that is a sign of good writing. So often present tense seems so stilted and awkward, but it worked fine here.

Definitely going on, even though, 800+ pages for the next installment? Whew! And ... a little (a lot) sad at the loss of some characters :(

This would be rated MA ... lots of language (some hilarious), sexual situations and of course, tons of violence/gore.