The Last Place by Michael Adams

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The Last Trilogy Book 3. Allen and Unwin, 2015. ISBN: 9781743316740
(Age: 16+) After the "Snap" occurred, sixteen year old Danby has found the world has become a war zone and with most telepathic survivors having their minds controlled by Jack. Danby has turned into a soldier and is trying to rescue any survivors she possibly can. Nathan and Danby succeeded in blowing an enemy helicopter out of the sky, but unfortunately Jack has taken over Evan, Danby's autistic brother's mind. Danby and Nathan must then escape from the Jack's and survive on anything they may come across. They must try and find some way to rescue Evan from being controlled by Jack and find a safe place to restart living.
I found the beginning of this book very slow to get into. It was hard to follow the Danby character as the story follows her in a series of flashbacks within a 3 month period, however when I realised I had already read the first book in the series I found I could not put the book down. So I would not recommend reading it if you haven't read the previous books. Set in the Blue Mountains I couldn't help thinking that this series was very much like John Marsden's Tomorrow when the war began series. I found the way that Michael Adams describes the life after the "snap" to be very realistic, particularly the way the characters have to deal with decaying bodies and the animals who without carers have become feral. With the amount of death and drug undertones I would only recommend it to a more mature student and readers who loved to read John Marden's Tomorrow series.
Jody Holmes

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