Burn is a novel about two men facing nearly impossible odds when the world they know erupts into chaos and violence.

Childhood friends Jess and Storey are on their annual hunting trip in the woods of Maine when they encounter their first destroyed bridge. Every road they travel leads to more burnt homes, dead bodies, and no contact with the outside world. With very little information to go on, they can only assume that the recent demand for Maine’s state secession has turned violent, leaving the two of them stuck in the middle of a civil war.

Despite being mostly a survival story, I found myself highlighting so many thought-provoking passages as Jess muses about his recent divorce and the mistakes he made in his marriage. He also reflects on his childhood, his relationships with his parents, and a forbidden affair as a teenager. I enjoyed the pacing and the details surrounding the survival tactics and didn’t find the action dull or the characters flat. I rooted for them from the beginning and wanted both of them to be able to return home.

Burn manages to be both a character-driven piece on looking back at the past when the odds of surviving the next few days are low, and a plot-driven novel about two men using what they know and relying on each other to get to safety.

Disclaimer: An advanced copy of Burn was provided by NetGalley and the publisher for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions are my own.