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FROM THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF LADY MACBETH AND A STUDY IN DROWNING
'There's one thing about Ava Reid; she doesn't miss.' Sasha Peyton Smith
'You'll start saving space on your shelf for Ava Reid.' Kendare Blake
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The Last of Us meets The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes in this stand-alone dystopian romance about survival, sacrifice, and love that risks everything.
By encouraging massive accumulations of debt from its underclass, a single corporation, Caerus, controls all aspects of society.
Inesa lives with her brother in a half-sunken town where they scrape by running a taxidermy shop. Unbeknownst to Inesa, their cruel and indolent mother has accrued an enormous debt—enough to qualify one of her children for Caerus’s livestreamed assassination spectacle: the Lamb’s Gauntlet.
Melinoë is a Caerus assassin, trained to track and kill the sacrificial Lambs. The product of neural reconditioning and physiological alteration, she is a living weapon, known for her cold brutality and deadly beauty. She has never failed to assassinate one of her marks.
When Inesa learns that her mother has offered her as a sacrifice, at first she despairs—the Gauntlet is always a bloodbath for the impoverished debtors. But she’s had years of practice surviving in the apocalyptic wastes, and with the help of her hunter brother, she might stand a chance of staying alive.
For Melinoë, this is a game she can’t afford to lose. Despite her reputation for mercilessness, she is haunted by painful flashbacks. After her last Gauntlet, where she broke down on livestream, she desperately needs redemption.
As Mel pursues Inesa across the wasteland, both girls begin to question everything: Inesa wonders if there’s more to life than survival, while Mel wonders if she’s capable of more than killing.
And both wonder if, against all odds, they might be falling in love.
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
'There's one thing about Ava Reid; she doesn't miss.' Sasha Peyton Smith
'You'll start saving space on your shelf for Ava Reid.' Kendare Blake
---------
The Last of Us meets The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes in this stand-alone dystopian romance about survival, sacrifice, and love that risks everything.
By encouraging massive accumulations of debt from its underclass, a single corporation, Caerus, controls all aspects of society.
Inesa lives with her brother in a half-sunken town where they scrape by running a taxidermy shop. Unbeknownst to Inesa, their cruel and indolent mother has accrued an enormous debt—enough to qualify one of her children for Caerus’s livestreamed assassination spectacle: the Lamb’s Gauntlet.
Melinoë is a Caerus assassin, trained to track and kill the sacrificial Lambs. The product of neural reconditioning and physiological alteration, she is a living weapon, known for her cold brutality and deadly beauty. She has never failed to assassinate one of her marks.
When Inesa learns that her mother has offered her as a sacrifice, at first she despairs—the Gauntlet is always a bloodbath for the impoverished debtors. But she’s had years of practice surviving in the apocalyptic wastes, and with the help of her hunter brother, she might stand a chance of staying alive.
For Melinoë, this is a game she can’t afford to lose. Despite her reputation for mercilessness, she is haunted by painful flashbacks. After her last Gauntlet, where she broke down on livestream, she desperately needs redemption.
As Mel pursues Inesa across the wasteland, both girls begin to question everything: Inesa wonders if there’s more to life than survival, while Mel wonders if she’s capable of more than killing.
And both wonder if, against all odds, they might be falling in love.
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Praise for this book
"Ava Reid's latest hearkens back to the dystopias of yore: a world of highs and lows, haves and have-nots, a drowning underworld ruled over by a city of brittle, icy beauty. Reid's observant, compelling prose makes this at once an homage to those classic tales, and something fresh and necessary, and all her own." - Kendare Blake
"A stunning exploration of an ailing society and the love that thrives anyway. Fable for the End of the World entwines the harrowing with the poignant - and lands an ending that cements it high among the YA dystopian greats." - Chloe Gong
"Knife-edged and tender-hearted, Fable for the End of the World will at once feel like your favorite classic dystopia and like nothing you've ever read. In a cruel, debt-driven world not vastly unlike our own, Reid explores the bravery of not just surviving, but learning to be truly alive. I will be thinking of the final line for years to come." - Courtney Gould
"With her singular gift for metaphor, Reid has crafted a frighteningly prescient dystopia about the ravages of corporate greed - and also a beautiful love story between two girls determined to survive. Brilliant and devastating, Fable for the End of the World will arm you with the strongest tools we have: both anger and hope." - Allison Saft
"Nobody balances sweetness with brutality, tenderness with violence, quite like Ava Reid. This hit all the nostalgic Hunger Games notes while bringing fresh sapphic blood to the dystopian genre - I inhaled it!" - Laura Steven
"A stunning exploration of an ailing society and the love that thrives anyway. Fable for the End of the World entwines the harrowing with the poignant - and lands an ending that cements it high among the YA dystopian greats." - Chloe Gong
"Knife-edged and tender-hearted, Fable for the End of the World will at once feel like your favorite classic dystopia and like nothing you've ever read. In a cruel, debt-driven world not vastly unlike our own, Reid explores the bravery of not just surviving, but learning to be truly alive. I will be thinking of the final line for years to come." - Courtney Gould
"With her singular gift for metaphor, Reid has crafted a frighteningly prescient dystopia about the ravages of corporate greed - and also a beautiful love story between two girls determined to survive. Brilliant and devastating, Fable for the End of the World will arm you with the strongest tools we have: both anger and hope." - Allison Saft
"Nobody balances sweetness with brutality, tenderness with violence, quite like Ava Reid. This hit all the nostalgic Hunger Games notes while bringing fresh sapphic blood to the dystopian genre - I inhaled it!" - Laura Steven
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