The 5th Wave

The 5th Wave is a young adult science fiction novel by the American writer Richard Yancey, published in 2013.

The invasion does not arrive with armies. It arrives in stages: the first wave takes the power, the second takes the coasts, the third and fourth leave the survivors scattered and suspicious of one another, and the rule that follows is that nobody can be trusted. Cassie is on a lonely stretch of road, running from beings who look human and kill everyone they find, when she meets Evan Walker. He is charming and hard to read, and he is also the only person who may be able to help her reach her younger brother. The question the book keeps asking is whether taking his help is worth the risk. The waves arrive in an order the survivors learn to count: the power first, then the coasts, then the people who were merely unlucky, and finally the rule that makes Evan Walker a risk.

The novel opens a series and its headings list alien contact, survival, war, youth and war, and dystopian fiction.