Bird Box

Author: Josh Malerman
Genre: Mystery/Thriller, Horror
Original publication date: March 2014
Book description: Something is out there, something terrifying that must not be seen. One glimpse of it, and a person is driven to deadly violence. No one knows what it is or where it came from.
Five years after it began, a handful of scattered survivors remains, including Malorie and her two young children. Living in an abandoned house near the river, she has dreamed of fleeing to a place where they might be safe. Now that the boy and girl are four, it's time to go, but the journey ahead will be terrifying: twenty miles downriver in a rowboat—blindfolded—with nothing to rely on but her wits and the children's trained ears. One wrong choice and they will die. Something is following them all the while, but is it man, animal, or monster?

Thoughts:

So this is a reread. The first time I read it was last year mainly because of booktube recommendations and the movie was released in Netflix. Here is the original review.

We have two timelines, in one we see Malorie facing the decision of leaving a house she has inhabited for the better part of 5 years with two children. They need to venture outside, take a trip through a river, and get to a place where there might be survivors. She is alone with 2 4-year-olds, you don't know what happened. The other timeline is 5 years previous when it all started and she is a few months pregnant getting to a house where the people receive her. In the house, there are several people and they are trying to find ways to keep alive and not go nuts with what's going on.

The whole time they have to be indoors, not peeking through windows, not venturing to open their eyes outside. The big unknown, something out there, the main theory is that it is a monster that makes people go insane and harm others before killing themselves. 

We have more of a mystery than horror, so you're safe if you are not too into real scary things. The main mysteries we have are what happened five years ago, why did Malory end up alone with two children, if in the house there were several people when she got there and the thrill of the journey through the river. 
The story is told in split, we have the journey through the river and then the next chapter Malorie remembering how it all started. Be prepared for that, you will get everything in pieces. 

It has a few lucky hits throughout and there is no resolution for real. You do not get an explanation, you are following a woman, she has no way of knowing what happened or the reason it all began. It makes sense. 

I enjoyed the second read a bit better.

There were several times it seemed too convenient, but others were so realistic in the scenario they are in. It's so mixed feelings but I enjoyed my time with it. It is a very fast read, I finished in two sittings, I could have done it in a single one for real but as it's a reread and you already have an idea of the ending it is not as compelling to finish it. But I still enjoy reading it again!

This book was picked mainly because of the post-apocalyptic challenge and also a reread is a thing I want to do often, especially as I just bought the physical copy of the book so its the best excuse to reread a book. One of my personal goals was to reread 24 books this year and I think I am well on my way for that, I did make a list of the books for that and now I am adding others at random, so I'll just count that as a few extras to have in hold in case I don't actually get through the original list.