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    The Forest of Hands and Teeth
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    The Forest of Hands and Teeth
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    The Forest of Hands and Teeth
    Audiobook9 hours

    The Forest of Hands and Teeth

    Written by Carrie Ryan

    Narrated by Vane Millon

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    In Mary's world there are simple truths.

    The Sisterhood always knows best.

    The Guardians will protect and serve.

    The Unconsecrated will never relent.

    And you must always mind the fence that surrounds the village; the fence that protects the village from the Forest of Hands and Teeth.

    But, slowly, Mary's truths are failing her. She's learning things she never wanted to know about the Sisterhood and its secrets, and the Guardians and their power. And, when the fence is breached and her world is thrown into chaos, about the Unconsecrated and their relentlessness.

    Now, she must choose between her village and her future, between the one she loves and the one who loves her. And she must face the truth about the Forest of Hands and Teeth. Could there be life outside a world surrounded in so much death?

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateMay 12, 2009
    ISBN9780739385357
    Unavailable
    The Forest of Hands and Teeth

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    Reviews for The Forest of Hands and Teeth

    3.5/5

    1,739 ratings273 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I really liked this book. End of the world YA zombie novel.
    • 3/5
      The story starts out with Mary, a young girl, who lives inside a fenced in village. The fences were built to keep out the Unconsecrated, or flesh-eating zombies. They live (or don't live because they're dead..duh..) in the Forest of Hands and Teeth beyond the fence of the village. Mary has always wondered whether there is life outside of the Forest of Hands and Teeth, and dreams of finding the ocean someday. She gets her chance when one day the fence is breached by the Unconsecrated, and everyone but herself and 5 others are turned. Then begins all of the zombie moaning, chasing, and running. I wasn't too sure of this book when I read the synopisis. It sounded too much like a George Romero movie, but after reading it, it had an actual plotline, and even a love story. The whole book wasn't about running away from zombies and trying desperately not to get eaten alive, although there was a lot of that in the book too. Hint: Don't read if you have a weak stomach, and don't read it alone in the dark......
    • 3/5
      It was ~really~ good, as horror, as it made me very uncomfortable (I can get grossed out by horror, or uneasy... the second being the more successful in my mind)
    • 5/5
      Really neat book.
    • 3/5
      This three-star rating is perfectly solid. I did like this book-- I especially like the thought-provoking world the story is set in. What happens when people turn to religion to explain the unexplainable? How do people use disasters to restrict the rights of a class of people? For starting conversations, this would be a great book to share.
    • 5/5
      Mary has grown up with stories of the ocean and of villages outside of here own. She always wanted to see the ocean and the buildings that touched the sky, but they held her back. The dead that roam the forest with an eternal hunger for human flesh. Her fenced in village has kept her safe, but not her father. He was bitten and choose to live freely in the woods as an unconsecrated. Every since the loss of her husband, Mary's mother has never been the same. Mary was supposed to meet her mother at the fence after she was done washing the clothes at the river, but her friend Harry appears and ask her to be his wife. Stunned, Mary stops what she is doing to talk to him some more when all of the sudden, the sirens flare, warning of a breach. Mary and Harry run to try and help, and to get to safety when the sirens stop. Everyone is confused, but soon Mary wishes she didn't spend that extra minute with Harry as she realizes her mother stepped to close to the fence and was bitten. Her brother is away, so Mary has to decide if they should kill her mother, or if they should send her into the woods. Mary lets her live in the woods as an unconsecrated because she knows her mother would be happy to live among her husband forever. Mary feels as though it was Harry's fault, so she steers clear of him. Her brother is upset Mary let her mother roam free in the village, so he refuses to take custody of her, and Harry doesn't want to marry her anymore, so she is left to live with the sisterhood. The sisterhood lives in the abbey in the center of their village. They are the doctors, the bankers, the scribes, and most importantly, the ones who keep the gospel strong in the village. Being forced to live with them means chores, reading the scriptures, chores and, reading the scriptures. One time while doing chores, she finds Travis, Harry's brother, who she actually wanted to marry. He has broken his leg and will never be able to walk the same. She continues to visit him in is room, where he is half conscious. She tells him of the ocean and all the other stories she was told as a child. As she falls asleep in her own bed one night, she hears crying next door, and talks to the person through the wall. The girls name is Gabrielle, and she comes from outside the fence, which means there is other villages out there. She goes to find Travis, to whisper in his ear all the things she has learned from Gabrielle. She finds him awake, and they begin talking to each other, visiting more and more often. They find they are falling in love, but Mary is not allowed to be married and Travis is engaged to Mary's best friend. She decides to leave him. One day she walks outside and sees Gabrielle through her window. She has long black hair and a red colored vest, but Mary has never seen such a bright red before. The next day she goes to talk to Gabrielle, only to find that she is gone. When she goes back to her room, she bumps into sister Abby, and sister Abby tells her that Harry has come for her, he wants to Marry her. The next day Harry, Mary, Travis, and Cass get married. Harry to Marry, and Travis to Cass. As the celebration of two newlywed couples dies down, they retreat to their new homes only to be disturbed by the sirens, and this time its real. Everyone knows which unconsecrated tore down the fence, the fast one with the bright red vest. Mary, Travis, Harry, Cass, Mary's new puppy, and a little boy escape into the fenced in path. Now Mary has to find where Gabrielle came from, or else everyone will die.
    • 5/5
      Mary has always wondered if there is anthing beyond her village, beyond the unconsecrated infested world. She has always dreamed of the ocean and the stories her mother has told her. Her father was taken by the uconsecrated years before, and her mother walks the gates surronding the village looking for him. While mary is washing clothes by the stream alarms go off, its her mother. Her mother went to far this time, went a little to close now she will be united with her husband forever roaming the woods. Mary flees to her big brother, Jed, for comfort. Jed though decides to give her to the sisterhood. Mary is horrified at the new life that awaits her. Sister Tabitha notices her discomfort and threatens the life of an unconsecrated if she does not join th esisterhood. Mary given no choice joins. While studying she learns the love of her life, Travis, may die from a terrible leg injury. Mary stays with him every night, one night while staying with him she discovers the sisterhood has brought another person, from outside the village into the village. Mary trys to communicate with her but fails. She notices her door is unlocked , mary opens it only to find she is gone. One day mary and travis are looking out beyond the fence and travis says he will marry Mary instead of Cass. Mary waits for him to come but he never does, she ends up having to marry Harry. On the day Mary and harry are to be bonded the sirens go off. It turns out the girl in the bedroom didn't disappear, the sisterhood turned her into an unconsecrated! She's back , but different from the others faster smarter. She soon infects half of the village. Mary cant make it to the treetop safe houses. She makes a dash for the mysterious gate leading to the outside, while running travis , harry, Cass , and her brother and pregnant wife. After miles of walking they finally come to an old abandoned town, but not without losing Jed's wife to an unconsecrated. Mary and Travis get stuck in a house while the others go to the towns huge treetop houses. Over time the unconsecrated finally break in the house. Mary and Travis make a fast escape to the treetops to be reunited with the others. The safe haven doesn't last long though a fire burns it down, but yet AGAIN they escape. Travis gets bitten and infected therefore resulting in him getting his head chopped off by his girlfriend Mary, Bummer. They keep on walking Cass is going crazy, harry MOURNING OVER HIS DEAD BROTHER, AND Jed OVER HIS dead wife. They finally make it to an opening in the fence. Mary decides to go through resulting in the death of her brother. She wakes up on the shore, of the ocean! She meets a man and together they walk off into the sunset. Overall I loved everything about this book. It was an amazing work of art. Though sometimes it was quite predictable I still loved it. Mary's character was unique and brave. She represent curiosity, courage,and loyalty. Her works was amazing! strongly recommend for those of you who love zombies!
    • 3/5
      I hate Zombies. I really do. The thought of them terrifies me, which is why I can only watch Shaun of the Dead with my eyes closed. The Forest of Hands and Teeth has some genuinely scary, if a bit unbelievable, zombie moments. It was almost comical how quickly the characters settled into playing house when there was a horde of zombies a few floors below them, desperate to tear them limb from limb. Was this supposed to show us how common this kind of danger had become to these people? That they could carry on with life so happily without pausing to worry about the imminent death creeping several feet below them? Maybe it was meant to give the reader a respite but it didn’t really work.

      I didn’t care much for the narrator, and found her romantic sub-plot confusing and sort of unnecessary. The reasons for her great love are never clearly explained, and although it is her driving force in the beginning of the book, she seems to drop it rather quickly when the pressing need to see the ocean becomes her goal.

      This is the beginning of a series, and it has the potential to be a good one. I can’t really judge this book as a whole though because I feel there were several vital parts missing. There are a lot of dropped plot threads throughout, and I’m assuming they will be explained in later books.
    • 2/5
      Well, that was not a very good book. "The Forest of Hands and Teeth" is such an awesome title. Unfortunately, it's all downhill after that. (All that follows has spoilers, though there isn't much of a plot to spoil.)I find it mind boggling that there are any good reviews, and that as of my writing, 355 people have read and reviewed this awful book.A zombie apocalypse came at some point in the distant past. Mary, a protagonist/narrator who ranges from mildly irritating to intensely unlikable, lives in a small village, ruled by the Sisterhood. Are they nuns? Is the religion they practice and teach Christianity or something else? Not clear. It is established that the Sisterhood has many deep dark secrets... but don't expect any of them to be revealed or have any relevance to the plot. Halfway through the book, Mary's village is overrun by the "Unconsecrated" (zombies) and she and a few others escape, but none of the Sisters escape, so whatever their secrets were, they are lost. A good story does not tell the reader that certain characters have secrets, intricately relevant to the plot, and then never even hint at what those secrets are.And then there is the romance side of the book, which is equally unsatisfying. Mary is in love with Travis, who is betrothed to Cass. Travis' brother Harry is betrothed to Mary. Will she end up with Harry, who loves her, but whom she doesn't love? Or will she end up with Travis, who she loves, and he loves her, but for some reason made his proposal to someone else? Well, doesn't matter, because for all the pining Mary does over her love for Travis, no relationship ever develops between them, or between Mary and Harry. And at the end of the book, Mary is separated from the few members of her party who are still alive, and that's it. No explanation of what happened to the others.Perhaps all of this is explained in a sequel. I will never know, because this book wasn't good enough to invest any time into reading a sequel.
    • 3/5
      I love the title of this. It intrigued me right from the word go, and it's also an appropriate way to refer to the forest in this book. I wanted more from this book -- in a good way -- I want to know how things got as they are, I want to know how the Sisterhood got to control the village, I want to know exactly what they did to Gabrielle and why. And I really want to know who survives and how. So I suppose I will be reading the other books in the trilogy!

      The main character is not really my main interest. She's so... selfish. I mean, it's understandable, but the other characters... I want to know more about Cass, about Travis, about Harry. And I wanted to understand her relationships with those people, too: less telling, more showing. I never really got why she was so in love with Travis. I could see he was likeable, in some ways, but never really understood what made Mary think she was so in love with him, when really, she was so easily pushed into giving him up.

      There's a lot of potential for emotional intensity and angst, and in some places, it hit the nail on the head. Beth and Jed. Mary and Travis, after what happens quite late on in the book... I feel like this has a lot of potential, that it's a good taste of something, but I wish there was more. There's a strong female protagonist, there's romance, drama, danger, horror, action. It'll probably make a great movie as long as you're not a purist about it. But I wish we knew more about how the world came to be the way it is in the books. I suppose it'll come with the later books, though.
    • 5/5
      I am not usually a fan of zombie/horror figures in stories, but found this story compelling and laden with thoughts about our world - this should be on a list somewhere!
    • 4/5
      A gripping, briskly-paced tale of flesh-hungry ghouls relentlessly pursuing the living.
    • 1/5
      I need to read a book in which the main character doesn't annoy the crap out of me. She whines all the time, "oh, nobody looooves me. wait, they do? well it's not enough because i want to see the ooocean. oh, i've now managed to get other people killed? but they didn't looooove me." blah, blah, blah. The characters I liked managed to get themselves killed saving the life of the whiny little heroine. Nothing really developed in this story; it was all running from one infestation of the zombie-like people to another. And how is it the teenagers always manage to survive and the adults never do? oy.

      This was an odd amalgamation of plot pieces from the movies The Village, Resident Evil, and some horrible teen coming-of-age movie--it's the last one that made it super annoying.
    • 3/5
      This was an interesting take on zombie stories, set several generations after the zombie apocalypse. Carrie Ryan does a good job of setting up an interesting community, fraught with many secrets. I really enjoyed most of the novel. I felt a little let down by the end though. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but something more than was there. It just kind of...ended. And hopefully the next story will reveal a few of the secrets that were hinted at.

      I'd recommend this book to anyone who enjoys zombie novels.
    • 4/5
      I wish Goodreads had a half star system, because this was better than a three, but I just couldn't give it four stars.

      The book was decently written and moved along at a fair clip, but sometimes I felt like there was too much going on, and the story would lose a little focus. It's a YA novel, with Mary (the protagonist) trying to find her way through life.


      Mary has grown up in a medieval like town, with a theocratic-matriarchal-dictatorship where mother church (literally the Sisters) will take care of everything and there are Guardians who help protect the town from a horde of zombies in the surrounding forest. In the middle of the whole strict-theocracy, there's the love/romance/triangle story and then some actual journey action (vs the metaphorical kind it seems like Mary is supposed to be on).

      All in all, interesting ideas, decent story, and Go Carrie Ryan for making a zombie book for chicks, because that's not something I've seen a whole lot of.

      I will say that my suspension of disbelief was cruelly tortured with the chain link fence.
    • 3/5
      Billed by Scott Westerfield ("Uglies") as a postapocalyptic romance, The Forest of Hands and Teeth pulled me through, and paid fun homage to both "Night of the Living Dead" and M. Night Shyamalan's "The Village."

      Author Carrie Ryan created a classic heroine in Mary, whose desire to escape the only world she's ever known (carefully maintained by The Sisterhood and The Guardians) turns what might have been ordinary zombie-fare into a heart-racing quest story.

      I thoroughly enjoyed this one, and won't hesitate to recommend it to older fans of the Twilight series, or to those who have been enjoying Patrick Ness' Chaos Walking series. Yes -- those are miles apart, I know, but The Forest of Hands and Teeth nestles between them quite nicely!
    • 3/5
      Great supernatural creepy-horror-type story. Lousy audio performance. Really, really horrible audio performance.

      As a stand-alone book, I think I would love this, but I suspect a sequel, and I think I've ranted enough times about the Everything Needs a Sequel phenomenon of teen publishing?
    • 4/5
      Zombies!
      I enjoyed this a lot. I was home sick from work and read Forest between naps. Ryan's writing is absolutely lovely; she paints a fine, if dreadful, picture of a world after the zombie apocalypse. It's not what I would have expected of a zombie book - there's a lot of care and humanity in her writing. Forest is also not a "Twilight" wanna-be -- though there is love and monsters, the main character is determined to live out her own dreams, no matter what the man who loves her wants.
    • 5/5
      This is amazing! Highly Recommended. On the surface this can be read as an action story with post-apocalyptic overtones when an undead plague ends civilization as we know it. The protagonist, Mary, lives in a village surrounded by a fence that keeps out the uncleansed (zombies) who live in the forest and constantly try to get inside to kill and eat the remaining humans--the forest of hands and teeth. As with all teens, Mary wonders what is beyond her village. She questions if what she is told about the outside world is true, and she longs for a different life. If this was all there was to this novel, I would not have remained interested because I hate zombie novels. But there is much more here, and the zombies are not the main story.

      Beyond the primary premise is one even larger and more interesting to me. That is why humans choose to live within a culture of constraint instead of freedom. Why humans choose to ignore their dreams to be something other than what is pre-defined for them. And does it take to force us beyond our comfort zone to pursue those dreams? Mary's world is bounded not only by the fence but by the Sisterhood--a religious order that controls everything in the village, that enforces every rule, and uses the fear of the forest and the uncleansed as the reason. According to the Sisterhood, marriages, childbirth, death, every stage of life must be controlled in order to sustain the village and ultimately the human race.

      When Mary escapes her village, she indeed learns that the forest is as horrible as proclaimed. The book's tension is a combination of learning of the horrors outside, fighting for her life and that of those who escape with her, and yet continuing to believe there is something more--hoping for something better. As in real life, there is no easy answer to this tension and though the ending is VERY satisfying it is not a fantasy-everything-will-be-all-right ending.

      A great debut novel that will drive me to read whatever this author writes next.
    • 4/5
      Maybe I'm going to need to make a zombie shelf. An interesting take on the genre, although I'll admit that I'm definitely not an expert. Not too gory.
    • 3/5
      Ok... personally, when I see a book rated 3 stars I tend to avoid it, 3 stars to me seems a very poor rating. However, I want to stress that I think this book is worth the read and the story is very intriguing, even so far as that I am looking into getting the next book in the series.

      So why did it get 3 stars? Well, it was more than 'ok' and I did like it, but there were just enough elements that annoyed me to not reach the 'really liked it' marker, especially when I compare it to other books that I've said to have 'really liked'.

      For one, and this has been said a lot about this book, the protagonist was a pain in the ass. She was selfish and weak and pathetic. She constantly wanted to be saved by Travis or Harry or Jed, and yet she repeatedly shows a complete lack of emotion at others' problems and even the death of those she supposedly loved. I did feel her frustration when she was forced to choose between two lives that she didn't want, but it soon turned into resentment. Also, was she losing her mind? The author's style was confusing, was she trying to portray a girl slipping into insanity or just a selfish individual? And what was the feminist deal in the novel? The village is seemingly ruled by women, the 'Sisterhood', who make all the decisions for the village and it's inhabitants... but then it is the men who choose the women to marry and if they refuse they face a life of religion because they are suited for nothing else. Plus, the protagonist's constant search for male approval and even permission at times is cringy.

      Then there is the zombie issue. I've never been a fan of zombie fiction - slow moving dead people who can be killed with a sharp knife aren't my idea of a huge scary threat. Plus, I'm fairly immune to horror. My parents are horror fans and so they relaxed the censorship on scary films even when I was a little kid - the oversaturation at a young age has left me pretty hard to scare (with the exception of The Woman In Black). This meant I never gelled with the main element of the story, the unconsecrated never sent chills up my spine and the point of the novel was slightly defeated.

      BUT. The story is interesting, you want to know what happens. You feel angry and frustrated at times but this just shows that the story has absorbed you. And the non-scary zombies is just me, I'm sure this book would actually achieve it's purpose with many people and prove to be a very frightening novel.

      AND the title is pretty awesome.
    • 4/5
      interesting book. very FRUSTRATING.
    • 1/5
      I would have enjoyed the book much more if I liked the protagonist. Unfortunately, she came across as dim-witted, over-dramatic and selfish.At the beginning of the book, we are led to believe she cares about others. There is a scene in which she stays all night on the other side of the fence, watching and waiting for her mother to turn into an Unconsecrated. But by the end of the story, we come to discover, though she may care about others, Mary is narcisstic and selfish to the point that she would jeapordize the lives of everyone around her to get what she wants--namely, to see the ocean.For a first novel, the work was well-written and had a few good plot points. The story suffered in characterization.I believe the author attempted to build up Mary's character by giving other characters negative traits that made her look better. Unfortunately, it did not work. The story came off as another zombie tale with minimal story-telling skill and an unlikable protagonist.Though I dislike giving bad ratings, this is not a book I would recommend.
    • 3/5
      As a high school teacher, I like to keep up with some of the books my students are reading (or might read). This was a fast-paced, entertaining book that went beyond the usual limits of this genre. There is suspense, romance, and a little more depth than I expected. My favorite scene in the novel is one in which the mian character, a girl named Mary, cradles an "Unconsecrated" baby...A few things I wondered about: the post-apocalyptic society Mary grows up in is controlled by women (the "Sisters") but division of labor and courtship practices are strictly according to the patriarchal model. And the isolated village where Mary grows up is just sketched in--the action takes place mostly in the "Cathedral" where Mary goes after both of her parents become undead. Overall this was a good, entertaining read. I would definitely recommend this book to my students, and to adult readers who enjoy YA Lit.
    • 5/5
      When I first heard of this book, it gave me a certain spark within myself. My ELA teacher recommended it to the 8th Grade at my school. He said "it might sound lame", but really, I was just thinking about running to grab it before anyone else would!! A book of zombies, survival, love, hope, and a dream that keeps you alive. This book can really reel you in... I was hooked!:)Mary, a young woman, lost her father to "The Unconsecrated" when she was young. She has lived her life looking after her mother, and looking at a certain someone whom she cannot seem to get her hands on. Mary is forced to join a holy group, The Sisterhood. There, she meets that special someone, who then shows her that she can't be something that she isn't. A terrible event causes their village to cease, and forces a group of survivor's (including Mary) from their home and find somewhere to settle, and not be haunted by the hungry moans of The Unconsecrated. Love tension begins to form between them all, and Mary is having to insist upon herself to stay alive and see what her mother used to tell her in stories. Sooner or later, Mary is forced to ask questions... 'Are we the last survivor's on Earth?', 'Are my mother's stories true?', 'What am I really here for', Why did this all happened to us?!'.The Forest of Hands and Teeth, is a must read book for all, well leaning towards a girls side, young adult book! Believe me, you won't be disappointed with the outcome!!
    • 4/5
      I have had this book for a while sitting on my classroom bookshelf. I heard that it was about zombies, so I kept putting it off. After reading this, I realized that it was not a zombie book but rather a book about survival and dreams and fighting for what you believe. Not sure I will immediately pick up The Dead Tossed Waves, but I'll move it up on my TBR pile.
    • 5/5
      I really hate reading about zombies, and I absolutely refuse to watch movies about them. They don't creep me out or scare me to death. They just bore me to no end. I mean, you have these decaying corpses suddenly coming back to life and munching on their own species. It's a little gross to think about. But other than that, there's nothing really interesting or notable about zombies. It's always the same, and it's always boring.Well, not this time! Carrie Ryan did an amazing job on The Forest of Hands and Teeth. In a lot of the reviews I read, people find Mary a bit annoying. I'm going to have to agree. She's also a bit selfish. But I still like her, and I respect the traumatic journey she has to go on. This story was heart-breaking and emotional, but kick-ass and action-packed at the same time. Every time a character was lost, I felt a little tug at my heart. These characters were ALL very likable, and to lose any of them put another crack in my heart. A lot of people who've read this were bothered by the lack of back story, but I didn't even notice while I was reading. Yes, I had a few questions, but they either weren't important or they answered themselves. And really - if Mary knows so little about her village, how can we expect to know any more than her? It is her story after all. This book was beautifully written and emotionally draining. The suspense had me reading straight through the night. I didn't put this novel down until I read the very last word. The Forest of Hands and Teeth wasn't what I expected when I discovered it was a zombie novel. It was much, much better. I highly recommend this to anyone looking for an emotional tale, a great zombie story, or something that's just unique and very well-written.
    • 5/5
      A must read for any zombie lover! This story is full of action and emotion. Mary is driven by her emotions and desires. Maybe the more logical people will find this frustrating, but for me it is what drew me into the book. Mary is betrayed by life. She loses her family, falls in love with someone she cannot be with, and learns the lies of her town. Her whole life is falling apart, she is tormented with emotions and chased by zombies. Seriously who can blame her?Couldn't wait to read the next one!!
    • 4/5
      I freely admit to being a zombie addict. I have a zombie apocalypse plan, and am constantly bombarding my husband about various ideas I have for evading the relentless flesh eaters. So, The Forest of Hands and Teeth immediately appealed to me. This isn't a badass slasher flick turned book though. It's an intense look at what happens years after the zombies take over.This is a dark tale and at times I felt so hopeless while reading it. I wanted a happily ever after for Mary and the other survivors, but that isn't what happens in zombie tales. There are points where I questioned Mary's actions and decisions, but what I realized is that there was a touch of madness in her. Her obsession with finding the ocean, even her seemingly thoughtless actions towards Travis and Harry, were simply manifestations of a slow descent into madness. And that really is what made this tale so scary. How would we all cope if our only existence was behind a fence and after being tempted into believing there was more out there, we were confronted with the realization that there is nothing.I really wanted a full round happy ending, but I know that if I had gotten that I would have been disappointed. Mary didn't need the perfect ending, and part of me thought that she didn't really deserve it after the way she acted. Ryan left readers with just enough hope for Mary that it didn't feel like a sequel hanging cop-out.
    • 2/5
      I am ambivalent about this book. The story is good (escaping from the walking dead) but it bored me to death! I can't even quite explain why I was fed up with it. I reckon it will make a good movie, though; teenagers running away from the crazies (like that other movie).