Review //\\ A Touch of Death

A Touch of Death by Rebecca Crunden

I think I will be devouring this series in the same way I did Lindsay Buroker and Pippa DaCosta’s work.


I’ve always had a soft spot for a misunderstood bad boy who fights for what is right, so Nate was everything I could want in a hero. Kitty was the perfect foil to him, their personalities and strengths helping them battle the trials littering the pathway. I found myself sucked into the story, the author’s prose exactly to my liking, not to verbose or flowery but with world building and detailing that allowed me to picture situations and settings.


The title should not be ignored, there is a LOT of death, turmoil and heartache to endure in this book. I may even have shed the odd tear. Though the book is set in a far dystopian future it had an almost steampunk feel, with a blend of futuristic and old fashioned technology, archaic traditions and cross-era clothing. Almost Planet of the Apes but with mutants rather than apes, and the humans still in charge. The theme of battling against a corrupt dictatorial regime is nothing new, but the execution, the characterisation and the setting made this stand out, and definitely left me wanting more.

Recommended to fans of Kate L. Mary, Robert J Crane, and the aforementioned Lindsay Buroker, all I can say is – WOW I loved this book, even if the ending did make me want to sob! 

Genre – Dystopian/Science Fiction
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41347040-a-touch-of-death

A thousand years in the future, the last of humanity live inside the walls of the totalitarian Kingdom of Cutta. The rich live in Anais, the capital city of Cutta, sheltered from the famine and disease which ravage the rest of the Kingdom. Yet riches and power only go so far, and even Anaitians can be executed. It is only by the will of the King that Nate Anteros, son of the King’s favourite, is spared from the gallows after openly dissenting. But when he’s released from prison, Nate disappears.
A stark contrast, Catherine Taenia has spent her entire life comfortable and content. The daughter of the King’s Hangman and in love with Thom, Nate’s younger brother, her life has always been easy, ordered and comfortable. That is, where it doesn’t concern Nate. His actions sullied not only his future, but theirs. And unlike Thom, Catherine has never forgiven him.
Two years pass without a word, and then one night Nate returns. But things with Nate are never simple, and when one wrong move turns their lives upside down, the only thing left to do is run where the King’s guards cannot find them – the Outlands. Those wild, untamed lands which stretch around the great walls of the Kingdom, filled with mutants and rabids.