Z For Zachariah: Robert C. O'Brien (The Originals)

I was put on to this book by a work colleague, having expressed an interest in fiction centred around nuclear war. This story focuses on Ann Burden, living alone in a valley, having escaped a massive nuclear war, having lost her family, who went to investigate the neighbouring town...and never returned. After living alone in the valley for a year, she encounters a stranger in a radiation suit, and is wary of him at first, but, when he falls ill from swimming in the contaminated creek, she nurses him back to health. But things take a sinister turn when she learns about his past, which he inadvertently reveals while he is experiencing delirium while fighting radiation sickness. I won't reveal any more, but I found it to be an engaging, but slightly unsettling book. It's been made into a film, which I have yet to see, but, from the novel, there's definitely room for a sequel. There's shades of The Death of Grass, by John Christopher, in that, human values are challenged, questioned, and distorted, to a point where humans cease to be human, and become savages, shadows of their former civilised selves, in the name of survival. It's worth a look, but don't expect a resolution at the conclusion of the novel. Like the future in the wake of a nuclear war, it's uncertain what the outcome will be.

This was a nostalgia purchase as I first read the book in school. I saw the film adaptation of it recently and wanted to remind myself of the original story as the film has significant changes to the book.The novel is an excellent, simple story written as a diary by a teenage girl and her discovery of a visitor to the valley she lives in as a survivor of a nuclear holocaust. The Hollywood film destroys what makes the book great by adding a third character and changing the whole dynamic of the original story into a predictable and sordid love triangle.

I have read the whole book, I love it it's amazing...But the entire plot is in that description!PLEASE DONT GIVE IT AWAY FROM THAT!!!!

Set in a post nuclear war America . This story tells of a remote valley unaffected by nuclear fall out . Of a girl who is the lone survivor and how she copes until that is when a strange man appears in a special radiation suite . What will they make if each other !

I read this book about 30yrs ago at school and it left such an impression on me that I was recently thinking about it and found it here on Amazon. I had no idea they had even made it into a film! Anyway bought it, read it, and thoroughly enjoyed it! Definitely not a book just aimed at teens. It still captured my imagination 30yrs on and if anything, I appreciate the cleverness and how well it is written more than I ever did before.

I read this whilst in high school. It had such an impact I always remembered the story. So, I bought it for my daughter who is now the same age I was when I read and it and she absolutely loves it!! Seems this book may well be a timeless classic!!

Read this book when I was in school, over 30 years ago 🤭, and it stuck in my mind, so a lockdown purchase and is still a good read and so relevant to now!!

I remembered reading this book when I was younger, and wanted to read it again. It wasn't as good as I'd remembered! However it's a great way of getting old books really cheaply, to either keep or pass on as I did