The Prey by Thomas Isbell

by:  Thomas Isbell
published by:  HarperTeen
publish date:  January 20, 2016

After the Omega (the end of the end), 16 year old guys known as LTs discover their overseers are raising them not to be soldiers (lieutenants) as promised, but to be sold as bait because of their Less Than status and hunted for sport. They escape and join forces with a girls’ camp, the Sisters, who have been imprisoned and experimented on for the "good of the Republic," by a government eager to use twins in their dark research. In their plight for freedom, these heroes must find the best in themselves to fight against the worst in their enemies.

I've had this book on my To Read list for quite awhile.  It finally hit my library's audiobooks and I went ahead and snapped it up.  So, of course, this is the start to a trilogy.  It's YA, of course it is...will this trend EVER STOP??  Anyway...

So, there's been some kind of "event", nuclear in nature, because many of the kids have birth defects.  They are forced to live in camps.  The camps are ranked based on the abilities of the kids.  The kids that are living in Camps Freedom/Liberty are being used for bait and medical experiments.  These are the kids that have birth defects, the orphans, the children of political dissidents, and twins.   Eventually, they figure out what their fate is and decide to escape.   However, their escape is far more difficult than expected in a post-apocalyptic landscape.  

I ended up quite liking this book.  I really enjoyed the characters.  I also really liked the fact that even though there was chemistry between the two main characters, and you knew they would end up together eventually, there was no insta-love.  While, there was a bit of jealousy between two boys, it wasn't really a love triangle either.  It was kinda like normal teenage stuff.    

I would recommend this one for the post-apocalyptic fans and the action/adventure readers.