“Fresh and surprising. Survivor Song may be one of Tremblay’s best—beautifully detailed, viscerally frightening, and deep with emotional resonance. —Dan Chaon, New York Times bestselling author of Ill Will

A riveting novel of suspense and terror from the Bram Stoker award-winning author of The Cabin at the End of the World and A Head Full of Ghosts.

In a matter of weeks, Massachusetts has been overrun by an insidious rabies-like virus that is spread by saliva. But unlike rabies, the disease has a terrifyingly short incubation period of an hour or less. Those infected quickly lose their minds and are driven to bite and infect as many others as they can before they inevitably succumb. Hospitals are inundated with the sick and dying, and hysteria has taken hold. To try to limit its spread, the commonwealth is under quarantine and curfew. But society is breaking down and the government's emergency protocols are faltering.

Dr. Ramola "Rams" Sherman, a soft-spoken pediatrician in her mid-thirties, receives a frantic phone call from Natalie, a friend who is eight months pregnant. Natalie's husband has been killed—viciously attacked by an infected neighbor—and in a failed attempt to save him, Natalie, too, was bitten. Natalie's only chance of survival is to get to a hospital as quickly as possible to receive a rabies vaccine. The clock is ticking for her and for her unborn child.

Natalie’s fight for life becomes a desperate odyssey as she and Rams make their way through a hostile landscape filled with dangers beyond their worst nightmares—terrifying, strange, and sometimes deadly challenges that push them to the brink.

Paul Tremblay once again demonstrates his mastery in this chilling and all-too-plausible novel that will leave readers racing through the pages . . . and shake them to their core.

Title: Survivor Song

Author: Paul Tremblay

Hardback: 320 pages

Publication Date: 07/07/2020

Publisher: William Morrow

Language: English

ISBN: 0062679163

ISBN-13: 9780062679161

My Review

Survivor Song follows very much as the blurb on the book states, but it is the eerie experience a reader is placed in with the setting and circumstance that is happening with the rabies pandemic that makes this novel a dish for the senses.

Natalie is 8 months pregnant. Her husband comes home with groceries and somehow, a zombie like and rabies-infected person gains access into their house at the same time and attacks them both. As her husband succumbs, quite brutally beat up I must say, she can save herself and races off in her car...but not before getting bit!

It's a race against time. According to the newest findings, a person infected by the virus can have as little as one hour before becoming symptomatic. A state in which the brain, gait, and overall body are affected before the immune system loses to a deathly battle within. An unborn child will not survive, so Natalie's baby has to come out!

Ramola is a friend of Natalie's and a pediatrician, up and coming at that. She is in the middle of organizing for her emergency shift the next day when she receives a frantic call from Natalie asking for help. Ramola wants to get her to the next medical center to get her screened and medically checked out.

As we have all seen it in this year of COVID, gaining access to important facilities becomes strictly regulated and procedural with check-in lines and requirements. Natalie has one thing going for her...she is guided through by a medical doctor. But this is not where this story ends. There isn't the right hospital staff available to take care of Natalie and or her baby, should it be born alive. So, they are sent off with an escort to make it to a different medical facility.

Along the entirety of their journey, Natalie is pretty frantic. She keeps digital diary recordings for her unborn child, trying to process her fears and the loss of her husband.

As a reader, prepare yourself for a long trek alongside the two in a world where chaos ensues, dark woods trap, zombie-like creatures roam and animal snarls echo in the distance. A dredging race on foot, on bikes and busses against time and a loss of hope. Will Natalie have this baby, safely, and will it live?

Told mainly from the POV of Ramola, she has to assess the situation and make adjustments as best as possible. She is the grounding force behind the duo, while Natalie's understandably erratic behaviors can be somewhat obscure or also misleading. Ramola tries her best to keep her friend consoled and give guidance in the most calming way as possible. At some point, I probably would have said, screw this...but she sees Natalie through to the end.

I have read one book of Tremblay's prior ones to this one and can't speak for any others, but my feel sais that he has an affinity with disturbances in the natural world and though there is a character-driven situation, the overall state of health of the world has taken a part in both books I read.

What always stands out to me is when authors write characters of their opposing sex and do it well. To write about a female, pregnant woman and make it feel authentic and relatable is not as easy I could imagine but it felt really homogeneous.

Survivor Song has two sections and across the entirety of the novel, there is a Prelude, Interlude, and Postlude beginning with "This is not...." that add a nice touch to the story overall. Those pages are of a different color and combined with the perfect hardback bind and book smell, I could not have been happier about experiencing this read. This book seriously is perfect in that sense.

I enjoyed this novel and it kept up a tension overall. There was a small part along the middle that was a bit long for me, but I admit, I was really eager to find out what happens. As with the other novel I read by Tremblay, the ending was not what I expected, but I am ok with where it went. It ultimately still had my senses buzzing just in a different way from the main plot as the book commenced on a reflective note on part of one of the characters. And so with that, I look forward to more books by this author, because I realized, I need more of these kinds of books in my book diet.

I hope this book sounds good to you as well.

Happy reading!

I won a copy of this novel at a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you as well as the publisher.

All opinions are my own.