In the Stacks

Read my full review at SFF Book Revie.I expected to love this. Steampunk Seattle with zombies! And it started out well enough. That first chapter had me right from the start. I loved its quirkiness and the flow of the prose - and then the actual story started.As we follow 16-year-old Zeke into the Blighted and walled city of Seattle to find out about his father's past, we stumble from one boring action scene to an even more boring meeting with people who have no personality. Since Zeke's mother Briar is following him into the city to save his ass, we get to do the whole thing all over again from her perspective - confronting other zombies and telling other people why she's here.I have never read a book this hyped that turned out to be written in such clunky prose. There are phrases in this book that make me wonder why nobody told the author to learn her craft first? The dialogue is just painful. There are a ton of... completely useless... pauses in every other sentence, there are logical mistakes, there is almost no steampunk element and there certainly isn't any Seattle or Civil War atmosphere. In short, the only redeeming quality of this book was that introductory chapter for me. It leaves me with hope that maybe with the next instalment, somebody edited the shit out of Cherie Priest and produced something nice and readable.P.S: I'm really sorry about this because I got a review copy from the publisher (first ever) and I really expected to absolutely love this book to bits.