Today I’m joining the blog tour for Kill Them With Kindness. My review is written with thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me on the tour and to Orenda Books for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

Compassion may be humanity’s deadliest weapon…
The threat of nuclear war is no longer scary. This is much worse. It’s invisible. It works quickly.
And it’s coming.
The scourge has already infected and killed half the population in China and it is heading towards the UK. There is no time to escape. The British government sees no way out other than to distribute ‘Dignity Pills’ to its citizens: One last night with family or loved ones before going to sleep forever … together. Because the contagion will kill you and the horrifying news footage shows that it will be better to go quietly.
Dr Haruto Ikeda, a Japanese scientist working at a Chinese research facility, wants to save the world. He has discovered a way to mutate a virus. Instead of making people sick, instead of causing death, it’s going to make them… nice. Instead of attacking the lungs, it will work into the brain and increase the host’s ability to feel and show compassion. It will make people kind.
Ikeda’s quest is thoughtful and noble, and it just might work. Maybe humanity can be saved. Maybe it doesn’t have to be the end.
But kindness may also be the biggest killer of all…

Review:

This review must come with a very rare disclaimer from me: nothing I will write will do justice to Kill Them With Kindness. Will Carver is an incredibly creative, unique and intelligent writer, and I loved the way the novel made me think about current events and the way in which society works.

On one level, Kill Them With Kindness is a speculative novel, which considers what would happen if a virus made people kinder and everyone in Britain was provided with a “dignity pill” which would enable people to kill themselves in the face of global disaster. However, if you’ve read anything by Will Carver before, you will know that his novels are much deeper than this. The subjects that he discusses are very topical, and the characters (who are sublimely developed) have traits that you might recognise in people in the public eye, and I loved the opportunity to think about these issues in a different way.

It’s difficult to talk about the plot on detail without giving away spoilers. There are moments of humour, moments that might make you angry and moments that are really poignant, and these emotions shine through the pages the whole way through. Kill Them With Kindness is a fascinating novel that kept me hooked from beginning to end.

I love Will Carver’s work and I can’t wait to see what he does next.

Kill Them With Kindness is available from Amazon.

You can follow the rest of the blog tour here: