Cover Image: Anna

Anna

Pub Date:   |   Archive Date:

Member Reviews

I am sorry for the inconvenience but I don’t have the time to read this anymore and have lost interest in the concept. I believe that it would benefit your book more if I did not skim your book and write a rushed review. Again, I am sorry for the inconvenience.

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Chilling and thought-provoking feminist novel set in a dystopian near future,

Anna lives an isolated existence in a barren wasteland, ravaged by war and disease. She was forced to flee not long after her husband was conscripted to the war effort, and she survives by her wits, carrying all her remaining possessions in her rucksack as she eeks out an existence.

She has survived like this for two years when she is suddenly captured, chained and branded by a man who manages to overpower her and claims her as his property.

Before long she falls pregnant and becomes even more desperate to escape. Seizing a rare chance, she breaks for freedom. But now she has more than just herself to worry about, and her captor is not going to give up easily.

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I must firstly apologise for the amount of time it has taken me to provide a review of this book, my health was rather bad for quite some time, something that had me in hospital on numerous occasions and simply didnt leave me with the time I once had to do what I love most.

Unfortunately that does mean I have missed the archive date for many of these books, so It would feel unjust throwing any review together without being able to pay attention to each novel properly.

However, I am now back to reading as before and look forward to sharing my honest reviews as always going forward. I thank you f0r the patience and understanding throughout x

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Maybe this one was too heavy for me or I had just watched Handmaid’s tale too soon to not compare the worlds. Overall a pretty good book but wasn’t totally hooked on this one.

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Definitely not my usual kind of read but I enjoyed this one which feels wrong considering the heavier subjects involved. I can see why some wouldnt get along with the narrative but personally, once through the initial brutality, it was an engaging and fast paced read.
I'd be interested in seeing what Sammy HK Smith brings to the table next.

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I usually like dystopian fiction but there was something about this that I felt I just couldn’t connect with and I didn’t find the plot massively engaging

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A bleak story set in a future where something terrible has happened. I like dystopian fiction but struggled with this novel and could not finish.

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Sammy H.K. Smith’s Anna should be a book that I love. A dystopian tale about a captured woman who escapes only to discover her past has come back to haunt her? Anna sounded like a book akin to Room, albeit much darker, and I couldn’t wait to read it. However, this novel unfortunately was flat in all aspects. With little world-building and character development, and only vague descriptions of people and places, this novel never fleshed out to its true potential. I felt myself bored throughout most of this narrative, and found it a chore to pick up this novel.

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This story starts as a post-apocalyptic story of a lone woman and rapidly turns into a survivor’s story as she is forced to live in horrible circumstances. It is a really good premise and could have been a great story with a lot of learnings. However it felt to me that the author was confused and sometimes projecting her confusion onto the characters and the plot. I sadly didn't enjoy it as much as I expected. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

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Thank you to NetGalley and publishers for this ARC

First off I will start with this book has been read 7 times!

I read this a second time because I wasn't sure how I felt. I adore this book and have recommended it numerous times! This has stuck with me, I must admit that I did not like the protagonist at all. I will clarify that with I did not like the person she represented not the way the character was written.

Read it you will not be disappointed

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Such a great book! I enjoyed reading this one so much! I highly recommend this book. Side note: the cover!!!!

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Unfortunately this book was archived before I could download it, so I cannot write a full review. I will try to buy the book and write a review at some point.

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This book could have been really good, but it was missing too much. It tells the story in three parts of a woman whose name we are never sure of. She’s in some sort of dystopian world, but we don’t really know why or what happened. There is very little explanation of her life before. You don’t ever really come to know her or care about her. She is captured by a man whose name we are also never sure of, and then she escapes from him and starts a new life elsewhere. You think she will find happiness but, of course, you know that would be too good to be true.

I ended up just skipping pages to get to the final scene because I really couldn’t take it anymore.

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Ugh this is the second book this month that I could barely bring myself to finish. The first half was more brutal than I would’ve liked but there are women out there who’ve experienced much worse so do with that what you will.

There was no segue at all into the second half, it felt like reading a completely different book and it was so mind-numbingly dull. A lot of new characters are introduced but honestly none of them have any personality and I could not distinguish one from the other apart from their names which I’ve already forgotten.

Spoiler coming up although I feel like it’s to be expected: bad stuff finds her again. The two halves of the story come together - but only kind of, and a lot is never resolved or explained at all.

None of the characters had much substance, not even the protagonists. The plot was never fully flushed out, the flashbacks to her life before with her husband didn’t really give us much which made them feel pointless, and overall there were just too many things that didn’t work. I don’t know, the premise had potential but I hated the way it was executed.

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Whatever complexities and harsh world realities the author was going for clearly didn't work out. The writing was subpar, the characterisation was frustrating, and the politics were awful. I would not recommend.

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Thank you to #NetGalley for providing me a copy of #Anna to review.

This story starts as a post-apocalyptic story of a lone woman and rapidly turns into a survivor’s story as she is forced to live in horrible circumstances. Unfortunately the narrator and main character of the story suffers from various social anxieties (because of the survivor situation in the first act? it is never explained) which made me grow to dislike this novel as the story went on.

Once the final act starts - in a way that felt telegraphed all through the book - the story unfortunately seems to get even more tedious, making me rush through faster than I would normally, just to reach the climax of the story. While I empathise with the main character and her situation, many of the decisions she makes throughout the novel made me feel simply frustrated, especially in the second and third acts. So, rightly or wrongly, I ended up feeling more annoyed at her instead of feeling pity for her. I could only feel good for her at a couple of points during the whole story.

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Beware a lot of trigger warnings and very graphic violence. In the end it wasn't a disappointment and was very good read. Can't wait to read furure work from Sammy!

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I was kindly given this book as an ARC to read and I was not disappointed! I loved this book and I think everyone should read it! Through this book we follow the journey of 'anna' going through life after the government has collapsed. It contains violence, abuse, trauma and so much more. I really suggest reading the trigger warnings before reading! This book contains so many twists and turns, so many beautiful moments and so many horrible moments. It truly gives us a look into what life could be like if this ever happened. Im so glad I got to read this book and I have went out and bought the physical copy already as I just NEED to have this book in my collection!

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Books that start with gruesome rape and enslavement of a woman are a mixed experience for me .. and I have to say I am not a fan. I get it that her abuser thinks he's hot stuff but we have little sympathy .. forced away from him into a new life, things are really no better and the tenderness is gruesome too. Not for me....

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this was another great and dark story, it really takes the book to a high level. It had a great plot and it really made me think. The scifi element was really well done and I loved getting to know Anna.

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