DNF Early Review – Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton (3/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Length: 320 pages
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Release Date: August 6, 2019
ISBN-13: 978-1538745823
Stand Alone or Series: Stand Alone
Source: ARC from Amazon Vine
Rating: 3/5 stars

“S.T., a domesticated crow, is a bird of simple pleasures: hanging out with his owner Big Jim, trading insults with Seattle’s wild crows (those idiots), and enjoying the finest food humankind has to offer: Cheetos ®.

Then Big Jim’s eyeball falls out of his head, and S.T. starts to feel like something isn’t quite right. His most tried-and-true remedies–from beak-delivered beer to the slobbering affection of Big Jim’s loyal but dim-witted dog, Dennis–fail to cure Big Jim’s debilitating malady. S.T. is left with no choice but to abandon his old life and venture out into a wild and frightening new world with his trusty steed Dennis, where he discovers that the neighbors are devouring each other and the local wildlife is abuzz with rumors of dangerous new predators roaming Seattle. Humanity’s extinction has seemingly arrived, and the only one determined to save it is a foul-mouthed crow whose knowledge of the world around him comes from his TV-watching education.”

I got this book through the Amazon Vine program to review because I had heard a lot of wonderful things about it. This book wasn’t for me but I think people who are into quirky post-apocalyptic zombie reads will really enjoy this. I ended up stopping around page 70 or so and setting it aside.

I have honestly had my fill of quirky zombie reads, post-apocalyptic novels, and am not huge of novels told from an animal’s POV (don’t get me wrong there are some great books like this out there but it’s not really my thing anymore). If I had realized this was a goofy zombie novel I probably wouldn’t have requested it for review.

The above being said, S.T. has a fun voice and is interesting to read about (he’s a crow trying to survive the apocalypse). The POV from the cat is also pretty funny. However, I never really found this book to be hilariously funny. I thought the language and “humor” was a bit too over the top, tipping into goofy more than funny.

In the end I kept finding myself putting this down and finding other things to do rather than read it. I started to dread picking it up and decided to call it quits. I never really engaged with the story, am really sick of zombie books (I went on a zombie book reading spree 5-7 years ago and never recovered), and just thought it was more boring than funny.

Overall this wasn’t for me. It is well written and funny in a goofy kind of way. I think some will enjoy and others will not.