Reviews & Review Links

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Professional Reviews

“Hardly the familiar post-apocalyptic novel of zombie attacks and desperate efforts to rebuild civilization–[All is Silence is] a personal story of a scared girl and the survivors she finds in the ruins of her world. Lizzie is hard-edged and gritty, vulnerable and kind. Her personality is so compelling that she grabs you by the heart and pulls you along until it’s three in the morning and the story’s over and you just want to read more.” ~ Don Sakers – Analog Science Fiction Read the full Review at AnalogSF.com

“Toils and Snares is a powerfully visceral and moving tale of a family’s intimate struggles to cope with the aftermath of a devastating worldwide plague. Robert L. Slater immediately engages us with the dangers of a post-collapse, lawless Pacific Northwest. Then he ups the ante by stripping bare the internal landscapes of wonderfully realized characters, as we share survivor’s guilt, parent/child resentments, and difficult joys on the path to heroically remaking a world for themselves and their children.” ~ Sara Stamey, award-winning science fiction author of The Ariadne Connection.

“Well, not actual silence. Okay, there are spells of eerie quiet. But All Is Silence is quite lively, considering ninety-five percent of the Earth’s population is dead. Robert L. Slater’s suspenseful, sensitive debut novel takes a grim subject and characters who face disaster, and somehow creates a thought-provoking yet playful futuristic romp. Slater juxtaposes the tragic (a young girl singing at a loved one’s deathbed) with the darkly comic (hey! plenty of unused dishes – throw the dirty ones in the backyard!). He grabs our heartstrings even as he keeps us snorting with laughter at the probability that, yes, this is just what a group of random teens would do if suddenly thrust into this Apocalyptic world.” ~ Virginia Herrick – Chanticleer Book Reviews. Read the full Review at Chantireviews.com.

“Slater has created a post-apocalyptic world that is inwardly and outwardly consistent by paying attention to the details. Lizzie, the anti-hero is the tough chick with a heart of gold. She survives the pandemic apocalypse that wipes out 95 percent of the world’s population [and] captures the reader by being so human that you can’t help being sucked into her world.… like Rowling and Suzanne Collins, writes about young people, but engages a wider audience, … furthering understanding of what it is like to be young in this difficult world.” ~ Christopher Key, Entertainment News NorthWest 

A fast paced, adrenaline soaked novel. . . . Lizzie, or Crazy Lizzie to her friends, makes for a rather dark character. A former cutter who has occasional suicidal tendencies, she nonetheless manages to be very compelling. In fact, all the characters manage to be interesting. . . . Slater is a very talented writer and he slowly ramps up the action and suspense until you’re flipping the pages almost too fast to read the words. . . . I’ll definitely be waiting (impatiently) for the sequel. ~ Kayti Nika Raet, Readers’ Favorite

 

Reviews from GoodReads

What a trip!  I couldn’t put it down and ignored my children to finish your novel. I fed them pizza and let them play video games, so they forgave me. Lizzie’s adventure is quite the ride…literally. I got choked up at the end.

~ Jesikah Sundin, author of LEGACY: The Biodome Chronicles

I have to admit, I’m biased – I love a good apocalypse story. I had the pleasure of being a beta reader for this book and I’m already looking forward to the sequel. Lizzie is a mixture of someone you can see reflections of yourself in at that age, and one you kind of want to shake. For me it’s a popcorn novel – you’ll be done with the whole thing before you know it and you’ll crave more when you put it down.

~ Janet

 

Story was AWESOME. I read it in one sitting on multiple devices because they kept dying on me. I couldn’t put it down. 🙂 Keep up the good work, I want to read the next one ASAP.

~ Lahna

 

Your book kept me up last night until 2am on a work night. I couldn’t put it down until I finished it. It was so good! I cried when ______ died.

~ Christina

 

It is a very good read and I highly recommend it to everyone. I bonded with Lizzie almost at the very beginning.  I like strong female characters (loved FRIDAY by Robert Heinlein). I was especially pleased with the way you always had females as equals in all the events. I never got lost in the story or put off by a situation, and if I wasn’t so busy I would’ve read the story in one sitting. 

~ John

I really loved your book, but since I’m an “old person” I had my 13 year old niece read it, she said that she like it.  When they leave Bellingham it really gets good and neither of us could put it down. We both understood why you had to kill off _______, …. one of our favorite characters it was hard to see him go.

~ Debbie