When I first met Katie French, we were freshmen at Eastern Michigan University, living on the same floor of the same dorm. I was a night owl then, and nothing has changed. I’d wander the hallways at night, looking for people to talk to who weren’t already asleep.
She was kind enough to not kick me out of her room, and as such, I got to know her a bit. So it was a bit of a surprise that this dark dystopian novel came from the mind of the amazingly sweet woman I met back in Jones Hall.
The Breeders is Katie’s first novel, and she’s climbed Amazon’s ranks as a self-published author, but I have a feeling that’s temporary, because she’s destined for publication. Which is good. This is a series, and I need to know what happens next.
So The Breeders is set in dystopian future, with a western flavor. Child-bearing women are scarce, and so when they’re discovered, they’re taken into captivity. Thus Riley is a wanted girl, and her mother, step-father, aunt and brother are forced into hiding to keep her and her mother safe.
It’s a brutal landscape, and more than once the imagery in the book made me cringe. But woven into this well-paced novel is a love story that kept me reading without being too sappy, something I appreciate when I’m reading a bleak glimpse into a dystopian future. It also has gun fights, which always add flair. I do appreciate a good western-style shootout, after all.
Who doesn’t?
You can find Katie at KatieFrenchBooks.com.
The Breeders gets 5 out of 5 zebras, and a wish of full publication as the beginning of a series, so I can have bragging rights of being able to say I knew the author before she was famous.
Ooooh that sounds really really cool! I love the premise. I’ve been toying with a similar (though not the same at all) premise for a while, but it’s always been in my head as a short story, not a novel.
Most of my ideas are novels that get wrapped up in short stories… Or never finished.