Summary-It’s been 40 years since the giant cruise ship Arcadia set sail. An illness known as the Virus has killed the people stuck on land and only the only survivors are on other ships like the Arcadia. This is the only world 16 year old Esther Crossland has ever known. She’s training to be a medic and hopefully get off the ship along with her long time friend and new boyfriend Alex. What Esther doesn’t know is that her older sister May has been working with the rebels led by the Arcadia’s captain to rid themselves of Hadley the despotic former admiral sent to the Arcadia as punishment. So when Esther is kidnapped by the rebels without May’s knowledge to heal their leader’s son Nik she doesn’t know what she’s getting mixed up in. Esther doesn’t want to be in the rebellion she only wants to pass her exams and get off this damn ship. But now she’s in it. May is using her own newly found freedom as a cadet based on land to send information back to Nik and the rebels while Alex finds himself conspiring with Hadley thinking he can get a pass for himself and Esther. After a botched attack on the Arcadia Esther finds herself with Nik on land for the first time in her life. May is dead and Alex has betrayed her. She still doesn’t want to be part of the rebellion, but now her guilt and anger drives her to avenge May and sink the Arcadia.
Pros-Esther is not a Chosen One. There is a plethora of rebellion based YA novels out there, but this one stands out for not having a Chosen One MC and romance between the Esther and Nik among other things. Letting May die instead of having some convoluted way that she survived a bullet to the head. I’m curious to see how Esther and Nik’s relationship develops and I hope there’s no romance since it was pretty clear Nik was attracted to May and that’s her sister. I wonder how much of this was inspired by the cruise ships from the beginning of COVID?
Cons-After May’s death Nik and most of the other rebels are quick to blame Esther who prior to just a few days before knew nothing about the rebellion. I would have liked some more background on the Virus and the previous 40 years.
Welcome to the Arcadia.
Once a luxurious cruise ship, it became a refugee camp after being driven from Europe by an apocalyptic war. Now it floats near the coastline of the Federated States―a leftover piece of a fractured USA.
For forty years, residents of the Arcadia have been prohibited from making landfall. It is a world of extreme haves and have nots, gangs and make-shift shelters.
Esther is a loyal citizen, working flat-out to have the rare chance to live a normal life as a medic on dry land. Nik is a rebel, planning something big to liberate the Arcadia once and for all.
When events throw them both together, their lives, and the lives of everyone on the ship, will change forever...
RATING :: 4.25 / 5
Review under the cut! 🚨 Beware SPOILERS! 🚨
Please remember that these are only my opinions. Read the book yourself - your mileage may vary. 💜
🚨 TRIGGER WARNINGS - violence, death, graphic descriptions of medical procedures, torture, betrayal🚨
After finishing Contagion, I was a little lost. I had no clue what to read next. What was I in the mood for? Book. Genre? No clue. So I opened my Spin the Wheel app, typed in a bunch of genres, and hit SPIN. It landed on TENSE, so I selected the first book in my library that looked like it met that description, and bam! Here we are.
This book follows three characters - Esther Crossland, Nikhil Lall, and Security Captain Hadley. Nik and Esther's chapters are in first person perspective, Hadley's are in third person. Took me a minute to get used to, but once the twists and reveals started, it made a lot of sense. Just trust me on this one.
The book begins with an announcement from the captain.
Good evening. It is 17:00 hours on Sunday 24 October 2094.
This is the captain of the cruise ship Arcadia.
We are currently experiencing strong northwesterly winds, a high of 50°F and a wind-chill factor of 25°F.
All passengers please be prepared for high seas.
Daily reported Virus cases: zero.
Days at sea: 15,934.
We begin by following Esther. Esther is at a diner on the Arcadia, a cruise-liner-turned refugee camp. She's studying for her final exams, and she cannot afford to fail. To fail means she will not be selected to leave the Arcadia for a career - and life - on the mainland of the Federated States. To fail means she will never leave the Arcadia.
Some girls sitting at another table mock her openly for being a "collaborator" - someone who supports the Federated States. The cafe owner shuts them down quickly by reminding them that all their food and supplies are provided by the Federation. Esther decides it's time to go home and packs up to leave - but suddenly, leaflets flutter around her, falling from the deck above. She shouldn't read the message printed on the little paper, but she can't resist.
CRUISE SHIP OCEANIA CLEARED!
HUNDREDS DEAD!
Just as suddenly, the Coalies (the ship's security, so called because of their coal black uniforms) arrive to begin arresting people. Reading unofficial documents and propaganda is a crime, punishable by death or disappearance. Esther discovers that the paper is biodegradable, destroyed by squeezing it into a tight ball, and calls out to let the other panicking passengers know. She flees with them - but not before noticing a girl who tripped and fell. She hesitates - should she help the girl? It will slow her down. She'll be arrested alongside her. She'll never leave the Arcadia.
She flees.
We switch to Nikhil's perspective. He and his best friend-slash-fellow-rebel May Crossland (Esther's older sister) run across the deck to escape the Coalies. We find out May is in military training and will be leaving the ship forever for active service on the mainland in a few short days. They slow down, trying to act casual so the Coalies don't suspect them. It doesn't work, and in their attempt to flee, Nik gets shot in the chest. He falls into the elevator shaft they tried to escape in, and his world goes black.
Back to Esther for a chapter - I won't recount this one, it's pretty slow and offers character development, world-building, and the introduction of her boyfriend and fellow classmate Alex.
Now, we meet Hadley. He's a grizzled, grim, cynical jerk who hates the ship and everyone on it. He spends much of his time in security headquarters, flying around the ship on a drone - right now, he's following Esther as she slowly makes her way back to her cabin, her family's home these past forty years. He suspects her of wrong-doing but can't prove anything. Technically, he doesn't need to. He can make something up and arrest her on the spot if he wants to. But he doesn't. He sits and he stews and reflects on how badly he wants the Arcadia and all its citizens to burn.
I'll stop the recapping here. Like The Family Experiment, this review would end up entirely too long if I continue. But the action starts in the next chapter, and it doesn't let up until you close the book. The pacing ebbs and flows, fast and medium, taking some scenes slowly and others at a break-neck speed. We learn about everything regarding the Arcadia - the divisions between the classes (split up by wealth, one class per deck), the gangs, the poverty and the disease and the Coalie overlords.
The only thing we don't really learn much about is the Virus. Forty years ago, during the great war that turned much of Europe into a desolate wasteland, missiles containing the Virus were launched into the heart of the continent. Millions died within a week. Several people on the ship take boosters against it every single day - others are forced to only take one a year and pray it's enough. The Virus has never been seen on the ship, though the chief medical officer suspects it is merely lying dormant.
And that's all we know about it. We don't know symptoms. We don't know how it manifests. We only know that, if a single person on the Arcadia is infected, it will wipe out the seven thousand people on board within a week. I'm hoping that we learn more about it in the next book in the series, The Exiled, but judging by its summary, I doubt it. That's disappointing - I love me a good viral apocalypse story.
There are a lot of characters in this book - makes sense, there are a lot of moving pieces on this chessboard. I won't list them all. We'd be here all day. But almost every character gets their chance to shine. Obviously we spend a lot of time with Nik, Esther, and Hadley, and their character development is incredibly strong and carefully handled. Because Nik and Esther are teenagers, some of their decisions are reckless, foolhardy, and just plain terrible - and that makes sense. They're teens, still trying to figure out their own moral codes amidst a ship-wide rebellion. Hadley also makes some pretty terrible decisions, but instead of being guided by teenaged angst, he is blinded by hatred and a burning desire for revenge against all who have ever stood against him. His personality doesn't grow and change, so much as it is revealed, bit by bit - makes sense, as he's an adult who already knows his place in the world. He is established as the villain the moment we meet him, and though we learn his backstory and motivations as we follow him through the book, he never once stops being that villain. I both pity him and love to hate him.
Even side characters get a chance to shine. Sim, for example - we meet him twice, once in the first chapter, once in the last, but we get to see him for what he is - a goodhearted man who's just trying to get by with the crappy hand he's been dealt. We meet the leaders of the rebellion. The captain of the ship. The chief medical officer and teacher of Esther's medic training class. The teens' parents. We get plenty of time with all of them, learning their motivations, their desires, and what they'll do to protect what they love.
Now then, time for warnings. This is a young-adult book about a dystopian future and a rebellion. There is a lot, and I mean a lot, of violence and gore. Esther, being a medic-in-training, gets up close and personal with a lot of injuries, and we get to see every second of that treatment. Now you know me, I'm not that squeamish, but there is a scene early on in the book that had me gagging. I had to set the book down for a few minutes just to get my bearings back. If that's not your cup of tea, absolutely skip this book.
Honestly? I wasn't sure what to expect of this book. It came out in 2023, so after the big post-Hunger Games YA boom, so my hopes were up - but I've been burned by generic, mediocre, downright boring YA rebellion books before. I went into The Stranded with cautious optimism, and I was rewarded with a fantastic deep-dive into desperation and what people will do to survive when the chips are down. The descriptions are simple but vivid. Here are some of my favorite examples:
I stand on the welcome mat my mother has laid outside the front door, the bristles like pins on the soles of my feet.
Mom pulls my hair backwards and pushes a bobby pin into it, scraping my scalp.
It tastes good, but it sits in my gut like concrete.
This is a fantastic book. I enjoyed every second of it - I even forgot to update my Storygraph stats until I was about halfway through the book and I had to take a break to refill my drink. Whoops.
If you like YA rebellion books, I highly recommend The Stranded. If you like awkward teens trying to make a difference in the world while still trying to figure out who they are, you'll love this book. If you like political intrigue, twists and turns, and not knowing who to trust - you'll really like this book.
Thanks for reading my book review! Remember, this review is just my opinion. I (almost) always recommend you read the book yourself and see if you like it!
HAVE A BOOK RECOMMENDATION FOR ME? SHOOT ME AN ASK!
