A generation has passed since the pandemic known only as the Infection ended the world as we know it. In a little town in the Appalachian Mountains, Taylor has known only a harsh and brutal struggle for survival in a land littered with the rusted-out remnants of a lost world. By day, she labors in a coal mine. In the evenings, she tends a secret collection of beehives, and uses the honey to pay for lessons in survival skills, such as hunting, fishing, and collecting herbs. Her home is a single room in a crumbling old motel, and her only companion is a pet box tortoise named Go she's had since she was a child. When her town is destroyed by a vicious gang of raiders known as the Nine, Taylor escapes with Dylan, the son of the mayor. Their only plan is to head south and escape the Nine's vast territory, avoiding areas contaminated by meltdowns and industrial pollution where mysterious illnesses plague the residents. Dylan has never known hunger or hardship and struggles to learn survival skills. He's never known a woman like Taylor either. He tries to pay her back by teaching her to read and telling her the stories passed down from the world of Before. They certainly didn't plan on falling in love. Taylor fights it every step of the way, because in her world, any emotional attachment is dangerous. She's been taught since childhood that love slows you down, makes you weak. But the feelings growing between them cannot be denied. Taylor finds herself slowly breaking every one of her hard-learned rules of survival. She discovers that perhaps some of those things she's always fought to avoid are the very things that make life worth living. . . . And death shall have no dominion . .
