Fable for the End of the World is a sapphic dystopian perfect for fans of The Hunger Games. The world is intriguing with a unique take on dystopian storytelling and I really enjoyed Ava Reids lyrical prose in crafting such an insightful story. Exploring themes of human nature, morality and the fragility of society, the author creates a compelling backdrop for our two main characters to reflect on their struggles and battle to overcome them.

Reminiscent of the dystopian novels I loved and adored as a teenager I thoroughly enjoyed reading this and I am grateful to Netgalley and Random House UK for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this ARC.

𝐀 𝐅𝐀𝐁𝐋𝐄 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐋𝐃 🌊✨

When I heard @avasreid upcoming (March 2025) novel A Fable for the End of the World is going to be a blend of The Hunger Games and The Last of Us, I was sold! Massive thank you to @netgalley and @delreyuk (@randomhouse ) for granting me access to the e-arc!

No spoilers from me BUT for a brief synopsis of the plot, we follow the dual POVs of Inesa and Melinoë. Inesa finds herself as The Lamb aka the latest sacrifice in The Gauntlet (this worlds version of The Hunger Games, where the public watches a contestant try to survive against an Angel) while Melinoë is her Angel, tasked with killing Inesa while the world watches the livestream😱🔪

The story is fast-paced, sapphic and the world building is really excellent! It really did feel like a love letter to the dystopian YA novels I grew up with and I had such a blast reading it 🥹🫶

And thank you to everyone who gave me so many amazing dystopian recs to add to my TBR! I can’t wait to get stuck into them 📚♥️

The Hunger Games meets a climate-ravaged watery corporate-capitalist nightmare world.
A love letter to the 2010s YA dystopians I grew up on.

I have to say I am kind of disappointed. I wasn’t a huge fan of Lady Macbeth and was hoping this would return to Reid’s earlier works - a dark study of characters and society. Instead, this felt so familiar in a mediocre way.

Inesa lives in a half-sunken town trying to keep afloat (figuratively and literally) alongside her brother. However, everything changes when her mother enters her into the Gauntlet to pay off her debts. She is to be hunted down by Caerus’s Angels - weapons created by the corporation that controls everything through their credit system.

Melinoë is a Caerus assassin, trained to track and kill the sacrificial Lambs. She is a living weapon, human parts, hormones, and reconditioning. She will do anything to avoid the being decommissioned and Wiped to become a corporate concubine.

This is very different to what Reid has written previously. Less horror and folklore dark, and more dystopian trauma.
This is blatantly a story about the horrors of climate change, wealth inequality, corporatocracy, and technology; made all the more scary by the reality.

“The world can break anything," she says. "Then maybe no one has ever really been in love," I suggest dryly. "Maybe you have too much faith in people."

Caerus uses the Gauntlets to keep New Amsterdam both riveted and cowed. Entertained and subjugated. They promise advancement, but through restriction and subjugation.

I think the blurb basically tells you the entire story. What is on the package is what you get, so there wasn’t as much tension and stress which is what you want with a story like this.

This sounds all negative - it shouldn’t be. I binged this in under 3 hours and I think Reid made very valiant points about humanity’s future and our attitude. It was just very guessable. More young adult than I had thought it would be. It also lacks Reid’s also usual beautiful, stunning prose.

Thank you to the publisher for providing me an arc in exchange for a review.

4.5 stars

⭐️ YA dystopia
⭐️ Hunger Games/Last of Us inspired
⭐️ Sapphic
⭐️ Slowburn enemies-to-lovers
⭐️ Tending to each other's wounds
⭐️ Apocalyptic world

As soon as I read the dedication to The Hunger Games, I knew I was going to love this!

Fable for the End of the World is a YA dystopian survivalist tale that is set in a Hunger Games inspired world where a single corporation, Caerus, controls all aspects of society and encourages the lower class and poverty stricken-citizens to accrue mass debt. When that debt reaches a certain limit, those indebted to Caerus are forced to offer up a sacrifice (either themselves or a family member), or Lamb, to take part in a live-streamed assassination known as the Lamb’s Gauntlet.

Inesa runs a taxidermy store alongside her brother and soon learns that her mother has secretly accrued a large amount of debt and has offered her as the sacrifice for the Lamb's Gauntlet. She is up against Caerus' assassin Angel, Melinoë, who has been trained, physically altered and conditioned to become a ruthless killing machine. A cat-and-mouse chase across the apocalyptic wastelands begins but both Inesa and Melinoë discover there's a lot more out to get them in the unknown territory.

I absolutely adored this enemies-to-lovers sapphic tale; the world-building was excellent, the slow-burn romance was tense and tender, and the prose led to me devouring this as quickly as possible. While at times this tale was a harrowing commentary on the brutality of humans, society, class division and even touches upon the control over womens' bodies, it also weaves a thread of hope and love.

A return to the era of Dystopian YA books! Everything is run by corporations, the world is ravaged by climate change, animals & people are mutating beyond the safety of the borders. If you or your close family rack up enough debt....then you have to volunteer (or volunteer someone else) to compete as a 'Lamb' who will be hunted down by a cybernetically enhanced individual called an 'Angel'.

We follow Ines who is not your typical survivor, she's not a hunter but a taxidermist. She's compassionate and not ready for what's about to happen. Her brother is the one who goes out hunting and is prepared to help protect her.

Then we have our 'Angel' Melinoë, she's an incredibly complex character and the background of the Angels is so disturbing. Without it though you wouldn't be able to empathise with her. She's tasked with hunting Ines down to rectify her mistakes made in the previous Gauntlet.

So I loved that this was a standalone but it read fast, which is good but also a tiny bit bad. I think it could've done with some extra breathing room to really flesh out the relationship between the two. It all happened rather suddenly. The ending also seemed rather abrupt and without resolution, it was certainly poetic and held a real great visual but I'm still not sure whether I liked it or not.

Overall, this was a quick read and a love letter to the YA dystopian trend of Hunger Games, Divergent, Uglies & Maze Runner. Hopefully, kick-starting even more! If you enjoyed those books then you'll like Fable For The End Of The World.

Thanks to Netgalley & Random House UK for this arc.

Sapphic hunger game meets the last of us.

Ava Reid never fails to keep me hooked, the tension in this book is out of this world.I found the world Ava created was so detailed without it coming across as she had just dumped us with the information.

Our two main characters had the best rivals to lovers story line ever.The storyline of them didn’t come across as forced, it felt very natural for the way the story progressed.

I don’t normally read dystopian so my rating is a 4 as the genre isn’t really my thing.

honestly, ava had me at sapphic enemies to lovers set in a hunger games/tlou esque world, but she kept me HOOKED with her creatures and her morbid whimsy, tension you could cut with a knife and characters who shone brightly together and on their own. my only critique is that it felt a little juvenile (for me) at times, but any moment i felt that little scratch of dismay, i was immediately distracted but something incredibly cool and gay happening on the next page \o/

thank you netgalley for the arc!

Loved this! A dystopian world, where those who get into debt have to nominate someone to run the Gauntlet - a televised event (à la The Hunger Games) where they are hunted by an “angel” and killed for entertainment.

Ava Reid’s prose is so poetic, and beautifully conveyed a sapphic romance between the hunter and the hunted. The world was so detailed and gritty, and genuinely such a cool concept (if you ignore the slightly alarming parallels with the world we are living in!). This was really engrossing, and I would love to read more about these characters and world in the future - I know this is billed as a standalone but there’s definitely so much potential for more. Sign me up for anything Ava Reid writes!

Thanks Cornerstone & NetGalley for the arc.

This is comped as sapphic hunger games and it delivers perfectly! Enemies to lovers with one being the hunter and the other being the hunted. A gripping storyline with a tender, poignant romance. It definitely tugged at my heartstrings.

It’s pitched as a standalone but I think you could easily get a sequel out of this as it feels like there’s more story to tell.

Absolutely flew there this, what a great read! It has all the feels of The Hunger Games meets Leigh Bardugo’s The Six of Crows, so what’s not to like! Set in a dystopian world where if you get into debt you might have to run the gauntlet, a televised hunt where you are likely to be killed but have a slim chance of survival. The world building is fantastic and my favourite part of this book. It’s believable, cool and just a great premise. Pretty much my only gripe is that I wanted this to last longer and the world be more explored, so you could actually take that as a positive that I just wanted more! I was sceptical at the start about the romance element but it’s dealt with well and I really enjoyed how it was wrapped up in the end. Keep an eye out for this one in 2025!

WOW. No words just mindblown at how addictive & beautifully heartbreaking this book was. Ava Reid always exceeds expectations but this blew me away. I screamed when I got this ARC & proceeded to devour it in record time: it’s the kind of book you start and can’t put down because you’re glued to the pages. The plot had me gasping for air, the romance was hauntingly stunning, the enemies to lovers executed so perfectly. I was rooting for them the entire time. The world Ava created was so unique yet so reflective of the current state of the world - it was heartbreaking.

This is a YA dystopian fantasy with a sapphic romance between the Hunter and the Hunted, a cyborg assassin trained to kill and not feel, and a brave girl who lives in a sunken town trying her best to survive. The fact that the Gauntlet (a bloodbath for impoverished debtors) was live streamed to millions of viewers for entertainment gave me major hunger games vibes and I loved it, while equally disgusted by the brutality of the public enjoying witnessing these murders and treating it like TV. The story of Mel, a product of neural reconditioning and physiological alteration, slowly learning how to FEEL and LOVE with the help of Inesa, touched my heart and will linger there for a long time.

Perfect for fans of Hunger Games, Shatter Me, Last of Us. That ending…. DAMN!!

I offer myself as tribute for every and anything Ava Reid writes.

*Sapphic* ~ *Enemies to Lovers* ~ *Dystopian*

Like many, I discovered Ava Reid through a study in drowning, and afterwards quickly immersed myself in, and became enamoured with, her back catalogue of works.

Like ASID, Fable has the reader in a chokehold with the beautiful prose and fascinating, wild, dangerous landscape, filled with dangers at the edge of our vision.

Like when reading Suzanne Collins, or watching episodes of Black Mirror, or spending hours upon hours evading reality with fanfic - I felt a sense of belonging in acknowledging the discomfort of reality. Wanting to wrestle with feeling small, a cog in one of many machines which are working against the hope of a future for most - but holding out for those moments of connection and seeing the beauty that filters through the cracks.

This was a harrowing look at the gritty othering caused through class division and oppression. The pain and hopelessness for those people living in poverty outside of the most protected bounds ‘given’ by immediate power systems, but also the lack of freedom within the apparently elite who gain ‘benefits’ but are still beholden to those in absolute positions of power, and suffering in ways unseen.

This was also a story filled with hope, and wonder, and connection, and love.

Thankyou to NetGalley and Random House UK, Cornerstone for the ARC.