REVIEW: THE THINGS THAT KEEP US HERE, BY CARLA BUCKLEY

 

 

Their routine lives had been moving along, with the ordinary stresses and strains of the day-to-day activities. But during that year, after Peter’s father had died, something seemed broken between Ann and Peter. So when they separated, it almost seemed inevitable.

But what happens next will also change them…and in very different ways.

Like a storm brewing around them, the first hints of a malevolent flu virus, (known as the “bird flu,” or H5Nl) is sweeping the world. Peter had been working on researching the virus when suddenly, everything changed, and quarantines were imposed. Ann, Bill, and their two daughters, Kate, 13, and Maddie, 8, as well as everyone else, would be locked into their home, like a kind of prison, that would bring them back together in unexpected ways.

What could any of them do to protect themselves? Would staying inside their homes, avoiding even their neighbors, and wearing masks and gloves ward off the curse? What would happen next?

Power outages, shriveling food and water supplies, and the violence of those who would raid and pillage….these atrocities would follow.

Many months later, there would be fewer people left, and little hope.

The Things That Keep Us Here is a horrifying tale of what could happen when a virulent strain is unleashed. Everything that made them who they were, as people, as neighbors, would be tested. Would any of them remain afterwards?

I could not put this book down, wondering who would survive and what life would be like afterwards. At the end of the story, the epilogue fast forwards to reveal more about each of them. And a closely held secret about Ann and Bill’s son William comes to light. The characters were so real, I could feel their experiences along with them. Their fears, anxieties, and the horrifying ways their lives changed irrevocably felt like something that could very well happen. To any of us. Five stars.