Digital Reads Reviews

Stranded was quite an intriguing tale of survival of the fittest along with the need of the characters to hide their inner secrets. As written in the blurb, 8 people were left stranded on a supposedly haunted island owned by a witch and only 3 of them survive. Did they? Or was it one man standing at the end?

My first book by author Sarah Goodwin, I loved the research that must have gone into this book to write about the right plants and herbs used for foraging and cooking. The 8 characters were part of a reality show which was an experiment to depict to the viewers the end of days kind of scenario and how humanity would react to it. 

Initially it was all honky-dory and complete co-operation. Far away from civilization the groups were made and politeness was left slowly behind. Human psyche was well shown as slowly the masks were pulled down, and real nature of primitive humans came to play. Our main character Maddy soon found herself right in the middle of maelstrom of groupism and being targeted at every point. 

The book had some graphic details of how all of them hunted her, the scenes shook me to the core even when they were thought provoking. Were we all animals in reality, where left to nature, would we become one? Kill or be killed. Would that have been the rule if the pandemic had killed more and left very few of us behind?

This book was more of a dark thriller; Maddy was fabulous in her role. This would make a great movie where each character would leave the viewers with a deep impact. Maybe then kindness would be more ingrained in all of us. 

In this, the author gave me a different kind of a read where the story kept calling my name even through my chores. I read the last section at one go as I needed to know if Maddy would survive it all. 

Read it! It is different!