Electric Kingdom

Content Overview

Overall Content
Severity
4.5

Language

10.0/10

Alcohol, Drugs, Smoking

0.6/10

Intimacy, Sex, Immodesty

1.5/10

Violence, Weapons, Blood, Crime

3.5/10

Potentially Intense Themes

6.8/10

**As an Amazon associate I earn from qualifying purchases. 

Electric Kingdom

David Arnold

When a deadly Fly Flu sweeps the globe, it leaves a shell of the world that once was. Among the survivors are eighteen-year-old Nico and her dog, on a voyage devised by Nico’s father to find a mythical portal; a young artist named Kit, raised in an old abandoned cinema; and the enigmatic Deliverer, who lives Life after Life in an attempt to put the world back together. As swarms of infected Flies roam the earth, these few survivors navigate the woods of post-apocalyptic New England, meeting others along the way, each on their own quest to find life and light in a world gone dark. The Electric Kingdom is a sweeping exploration of love, art, storytelling, eternal life, and above all, a testament to the notion that even in an exterminated world, one person might find beauty in another.

-Excerpt taken from Goodreads

Check Goodreads to see the book’s ratings.

My Opinion

4.5 out of 5 stars (4.5 / 5) This definitely deserves the mind-blowing emoji.

This is delightfully bizarre and oddly beautiful. The story is fascinating and unique from the start and easily carried me throughout. It dropped bits of info for me here and there and made my mind spin with possibilities.

I did not see the twist coming. Oh, but how I loved it and all that it entailed. How did I not see it? It just makes so much sense now.

The writing is lush and poetic. I was lost in the words way before I was lost in the story. Arnold has talent for deep, insightful writing that brings emotion to the surface while making you contemplate each meaning.

The psychology of post apocalyptic worlds is utterly fascinating to me. I love seeing how people view what would cause a downfall and how humankind would react. The world created is usually mind numbing and sad but always a bit hopeful. Arnold was able to do this but threw in an extra twist for reflection. 

I’m impressed and I will be looking for more of his works in the future. 

Content summary: Excessive F words, many emotional or sensitive moments that may be hard for some to read. There is attempted rape, suicide, murder and many scary, life-threatening moments.

Thank you to Penguin Teen for the gifted copy in exchange for an honest review. This book releases February 9, 2021.

Detailed Content Review

Language 

F***- 44

H***- 3

S***- 32

A**- 3

B****-

D***- 4

Bas****-

Religious Cursing

J****-

Chr***-

G**- 19

L***-

Derogatory terms etc-

Alcohol, Drugs, Smoking

A woman smokes a cigarette.

A person likes to drink wine some nights.

A family talks of beer and butter wine. 

A person sips wine. 

A person drinks 2 bottles of wine from the bottle. 

Intimacy, Sex, Immodesty

*No LGBTQ+ aspects included*

A young man urinates in front of people.

“… as he understood sex: he had been told by those he trusted that it worked a certain way, and so he believed it; its qualities, while supposedly miraculously effective, were a complete mystery; its implications were terrifying.”

People wonder what a young man and young woman were doing in the woods but, “it was obvious enough.”

A man wants a young woman to “multiply and replenish the earth” with a man. She is unwilling. 

Two men hold a woman captive to rape her. 

A young woman and young man kiss. Again.

A young woman and young man kiss.

Violence, Weapons, Crime, Blood

A young woman finds a room with three bodies and lots of blood covering the floor and walls. Two adult bodies are hovered over a child body. One body has missing eyes and ears with many abrasions on its head. Another body has missing hands. 

**SPOILER** A man shoots a rock with a slingshot and it hits a young teen. He falls. Blood covers his friends hands as she holds him as he dies. 

A young woman pulls a man’s hair and punches his throat. She then bites his throat and he falls to the floor, convulsing as she spits out his skin. He is shot in the leg and another man is shot dead. A young woman shoots the man again. 

Two men hold a young woman captive. She fights and bites a chunk off one ear and “busted” the other man’s testicle. 

Potentially Intense Themes

A woman tries to swerve from hitting a kid in the road and her car falls on its side, sliding. 

A pregnant woman is going into labor. Her water just broke. 

Fly swarms attack living things (humans and animals) and eat all of it except bones. They come in large waves. There are many scary moments when these are seen and teens have to run and hide. 

“People-bits” are left in houses where the people died and the flies haven’t devoured them yet. A group tries to avoid people-bits wherever they go. The flies leave the hollowed out bodies as stacks of bones.

A hanging body is seen. Suicide. 

A man hallucinates regularly. His wife before him did too and she died. 

A mother and father were taken and killed by the fly swarm. Their kids saw it happen. 

A young woman sees the bones of a small child. 

A young mother is very sick and dying. When she dies, young teens bury her and grieve. 

A group of young teens see many “people-bits.”

Fly flu causes many symptoms; hallucinations, dementia, inexhaustible hunger (eating their own limbs), and rectal prolapse (organs falling out).

Previously, a young boy fell from a height and became paralyzed. 

Two people are carried away by the flies and killed. 

Bones of a woman are found. Her hand is on a gun, her skull separate. She lies in front of a small grave. Teens determine she shot herself then flies got her body. 

Thoughts of a young teen, “…I know you are sick or sad or both, and you want to go sit by that tree and put a gun under your chin, but that gun will only shatter your teeth and give you a weird flap on the top of your head, and the Flies will make off with what ’s left.”

A man is consumed by flies as teens watch. 

A young woman tells of a young man’s animal-like screams when he was taken and consumed by the flies. 

A young woman finds a man hanging. Suicide. His head is large and purple. 

A story tells of a man and woman jumping off a cliff together. 

**Any quotes from the book are taken from the advance copy and therefore may not be fully accurate or correctly compare to the final copy of the book.

**As an Amazon associate I earn from qualifying purchases. 

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