Endure

End Times Alaska, Book 1

By: Craig Martelle

Narrated by: Chris Abernathy

A nuclear bomb has destroyed Fairbanks, Alaska. How will Chuck and his family survive? What would you do if you lost power, water, and the protection of law enforcement, all in an instant; and what if you knew it was never coming back? A retired Marine and survivalist, Chuck, his brilliant and brave wife, Madison, and their remarkable children are thrown from the modern world into a dystopian wasteland in the span of a few heartbeats. Now it's up to Chuck to build a new life in a post-apocalyptic world that becomes more dangerous every day.

Join the Nagys as they do more than simply survive a devastating surprise attack: They thrive. They learn to protect themselves. They venture into the devastated city for essential supplies, and fight wolves, wildlife, and desperate humans. Ultimately they rally other survivors to build a new community. But when the faceless enemy that ended their world returns, they learn a harsh new truth: They must run for their lives through 300 miles of a frozen Alaskan wilderness if they hope to endure.

©2016 Craig Martelle (P)2016 Permuted Press

Chuck the closet prepper.

This is a tale of survival by our protagonist Chuck and his family in Alaska after Fairbanks had been nuked. Why would anyone nuke Fairbanks? Perhaps the precursor to a Russian invasion, which is the way I believe Russians would come if they were inclined to do such a thing. Chuck, a closet prepper by his own description, busied himself with gathering needed supplies for his family. A lodge in Chena Hot Springs a couple hours away was their first search for survivors. It must be an Alaska thing with far distances between people because the lodge employees had no idea of what had happened. How do you miss a nuclear bomb going off within driving distance? The employees stayed put and set their minds to making a go of it at the lodge. Needs and wants were the first thing in Chuck’s mind and he steadily set about gathering equipment, food and supplies for his family. The thing that bothered me the most was that there was little concern for looters and those that would take what was yours. The story was quite interesting, confusing and frustrating at times, but enjoyable all the same. I’ve already picked up book two. Narration by Chris Abernathy was excellent. Well done Mr. Martelle. Three.point.five for a good start.

Endure

I got the first book on a whim and when I got around to listening to it I had to hurry and buy the next one right away and now I am saving to get the rest. This is a book that will keep you up past your bedtime or have you taking the long way home from work so you can listen longer if you have the audio version which by the way is well worth it as narrator Chris Abernathy does such a awesome job you will want all of them as a audio. Craig Martelle brings Alaska alive in this post apocalyptic series where it seems only Alaska is attacked and Chuck and his young family has to survive but to what lengths will they have to go to survive?

A utopian-like post-apocalyptic story

3.5 out of 5 stars

I'm always curious to see how people in already forgotten parts of the map would survive after some sort of apocalypse. Endure gives me that chance with Chuck and his family. They live on the outskirts of Fairbanks, Alaska which has just been hit with some sort of nuclear bomb. Chuck and family must first figure out what happens and then figure out how to survive the bitter cold and sunless days after this attack.

Another book blogging friend of mine asked what I thought of Endure as I was reading it. My comment to her was that it felt tame. It was honestly one of the tamest post-apocalyptic books I've ever read. I wonder if Martelle was trying to envision the world where not everyone was out to get everyone else. Where the main character would face issues, but they were typical and normal survival issues (not ones where people are always attacking them for no reason).

Endure almost felt like a utopian-like post-apocalyptic book. It felt like Martelle was writing a "what if people got along?" type of story. Sure there was still violence and people couldn't hack it. But, overall, the book felt very hopeful.

Some of the reasons I scored it the way I did involve the total abrupt stop of an ending. I see "to be continued" type endings all the time. Especially in post-apocalyptic books. I'm used to them (they used to really bother me). But Endure just... ends. He was about to go out looking for answers and it was just over. I think that Martelle could have done a little better ending this so that the reader doesn't feel completely betrayed by the abruptness of it.

Another reason for the less than 4 score is that there were times when it felt really well thought out. The sentences went perfectly from one to another. The story just flowed like a story should. But there were parts that felt a little choppy. Like Martelle had an idea, but couldn't figure out how to work it in properly. Normally it doesn't warrant a comment, but I felt I needed to explain my 3.5 stars for a book in a series that I will be continuing.

The narration, done by Chris Abernathy was pretty well done. He allowed the story to flow well without causing any distractions or issues.

Endure

Characters are believable although background info on them needs to be fleshed out more. More depth.

Exactly what I was looking for!

Listen up! I asked all of my thousand-plus social media followers what to read next. I had specific parameters, such as: post-apocalyptic, non zombie, realistic... and they really came through for me! This is an EXCELLENT series!!! I literally have already read through book 2, before I bothered to stop and review! I was looking for something similar to Franklin Horton's Borrowed World series. This was an AWESOME find! Thank you for an awesome read, and thank you to the guy in Australia who recced two book series by this author! I'll be pretty busy for a while!

Okay for Teenagers...but I'm an Adult

What did you like best about Endure? What did you like least?

The story could have been good...it was just unrealistic. Too clean, tidy, & tight...for the aftermath of whatever disaster it was. (?)

Who was your favorite character and why?

The Old Musher--He was realistic character

Would you listen to another book narrated by Chris Abernathy?

No. Too smarmy. Not realistic

Any additional comments?

It's worth a 'listen' if you like a very cleaned-up version of the perfect family hit by a global (?) disaster. It's only just over 5 hrs long.

Poorly written

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

Nobody

What could Craig Martelle have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Make it realistic. Don't tell the reader the main charactor is military intelligence then have him not bother to use those skills to find out what happened. The charactor sketches were very weak and the story line was unrealistic. Beyhond the title that sucked me in the story was empty.

Would you listen to another book narrated by Chris Abernathy?

Maybe

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

The book had a great title. It just needed a real author.

Not well told or written

I honestly hate to leave a bad review to a author. I know how hard it is to put ideas down on paper in a fluid entertaining way. So let's call this constructive criticism.

The pace of the story is severely off.
A nuclear strike in a major Alaskan town not far from the characters home yet I never felt that they was fearful for their lives. No real drama. In fact at one point they take their snowmobiles to a "resort" and have a vacation of sorts.
The narrating was not easy to set through. Not to be to badly harsh ,
I couldn't even bare time finish the story and I paid for it. There was no connection with the characters, nothing drew me in and made me want to know what's next. Mostly everything seemed to come way to easily for the family. The fight with the wolves was the only dramatic event yet it was not "gripping".