The Forest of Hands and Teeth

Ryan, Carrie. The Forest of Hands and Teeth. Delacorte Books, 2010.

In Mary's world there are simple truths. The Sisterhood always knows best. The Guardians will protect and serve. The Unconsecrated will never relent. And you must always mind the fence that surrounds the village; the fence that protects the village from the Forest of Hands and Teeth. But, slowly, Mary’s truths are failing her. She’s learning things she never wanted to know about the Sisterhood and its secrets, and the Guardians and their power, and about the Unconsecrated and their relentlessness. When the fence is breached and her world is thrown into chaos, she must choose between her village and her future—between the one she loves and the one who loves her. And she must face the truth about the Forest of Hands and Teeth. Could there be life outside a world surrounded in so much death?

Good points: There's a sort-of happy ending. There are zombie babies. The story is suspenseful.

Bad points: The ending took too long to resolve. The characters had trauma after trauma, with hardly any break; any story I have to describe using the phrase, "And then they almost die again" is a problem. Also, I listened to the audio version of this book; that was a bad life choice. The narrator has Shatner-esque pauses in her speech and gives Sister Tabitha and Jacob really weird accents (think of Counselor Troi in the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation and you'll be pretty close). It was obnoxious. But I was in my car, and I can't exactly read a print book while I drive, so I put up with it. The narration got a bit better. The story didn't.