Review: The Forest of Hands and Teeth

The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



Mary lives in a village surrounded by high fences and look-out posts. The village is in the middle of the forest. Outside the fences are the “unconsecrated”, waiting to bite and infect anyone they can get their hands on. Inside the Sisters are the moral and religious dictators and the Guardians are the protection force. Slowly Mary learns that all they have been taught about village life, and more importantly, what is beyond the fence, is false.

This is a post-apocalyptic thriller of the first order. Only in this case the apocalypse was a virus that that killed it’s host and then made those people return from the dead. I’ve tried to read zombie books in the past and did not like them. I’d heard so many good reviews on this one that I picked it up without realizing the “unconsecrated” were zombies. I would have put it back down if I had…I’m glad I didn’t! The threat of the zombies is a constantly looming presence, but the zombies don’t take center stage, if that makes sense.

At heart this is a love story. Mary is driven by the love of her family, specifically her Mother. She longs for the life her mother has told her about from the past, she longs to leave the forest and see the ocean…but doesn’t know if it’s even possible. Mary, also loves a man, who is supposed to marry her best friend, while Mary is promised in marriage to his brother. This is a heart-wrenching tale of love and survival against the most spectacular odds, odds definitely not in Mary’s favor! I could feel Mary’s anguish at her circumstances...and yet I found her very difficult to like due to her selfishness. She could be so focused on what she wanted she didn’t bother to stop and see how she was affecting those around her.

Carrie Ryan as a beautiful lyrical quality to her writing. Upon finishing “Hands and Teeth”, I immediately downloaded the other two books in this series, “Dead Tossed Waves” and “Dark and Hollow Places”. It always makes me so happy to fall in love with a book and then know there is more to the story, out there, especially if I don’t have to wait for volumes that still need to be published!




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