Book review
Written by Alden Bell
Tor hardback
Release date Out now

Fifteen-year-old Temple lives on her wits in a post-apocalyptic world, carrying a burden of guilt that she believes she will never lose…

In a publishing environment where every third novel appears to be about a zombie apocalypse (whether it’s mash-ups of classic tales and horror tropes, or your common-or-garden end of the world scenario), The Reapers are the Angels comes as a breath of… well not fresh air, exactly, given its nature, but certainly as a pleasant surprise.

Comparisons with classics such as an A Canticle for Leibowitz and I am Legend for once are justified: this is a haunting, poetic tale in which the zombies (or meatskins, as they’re known here) are almost irrelevant. Alden Bell charts a tragic tale, which has echoes of Of Mice and Men and Crime and Punishment – not the sort of novels that would normally inspire such fiction.

Bell’s style takes a little getting used to (there are no speech marks throughout the story), but it’s appropriate to a story where so much is internalised. There’s an overpowering feeling that the characters are heading to a predestined fate, and in some cases embrace that as redemption for their perceived failings. Paul Simpson

VERDICT: 9/10
Not to be missed.