Wayward by Blake Crouch

 If "Pines" set the tempo for a blockbuster opening, "Wayward" lives up to the name. 

In the first book of the trilogy, "Pines" Crouch introduce us to Ethan who finds himself in a creepy hospital where he is not sure if they are treating him to make him better or messing his medication to actually kill him. He is confused as to where he is and why his belongings are missing. The sheriff of the town is not much helpful and even ends up roughing him. He recollects that he was a secret service agent who was sent to that creepy little town in search of his fellow agents who were visiting the town before him and have been missing. While trying to escape from that town he notices an electrified fence and hears weird noises which makes him wonder if the fence was to keep the town people inside or to keep something away. The entire town tries to beat him to death as a punishment for trying to escape the town. Despite getting beaten to his last breath, he somehow manages to cross the fence and comes face to face with some weird yet dangerous creatures that try to kill him. He manages to escape from them and reaches a mountain where he finds the real reason behind all the happenings in his life ever since he woke up in the hospital. He gets to know that humanity as we are at present ran the risk of their genes mutating into something animal like in a couple of thousand years and sensing the eventual extinction of human race as we are, a mad great scientist Pilcher, builds an entire town, Wayward Pines, capable of surviving thousands of year and being habitable, storing provisions that would survive and above all, identifying people who would be put into cryogenic sleep, so that they can be the last surviving humans with the DNA sequence as we are having now. He keeps another set of scientists along with 100 plus security staff to run and maintain the facilities, safely harbored atop a mountain overlooking the town. After surviving and managing to reach the mountaintop facility, Pilcher offers Ethan a chance to become the Sheriff of Wayward Pines town and keep the people living there under the control of Pilcher. 

The second part, which is "Wayward", the story begins with a restless Ethan feeling suffocated to live under such constant supervision, where every word and act of everyone in the town are monitored by Pilcher and team from their safe place. When Ethan asks why Pilcher is keeping these people segregated within the town, he replies, the world as we know now is devastated by several natural and man made calamities and the area outside of the town is inhabited by millions of aberration humans whom he calls as "abbies", which are a carnivorous lot and no human in their present form can survive outside of the town. When enquired why this reason is not shared with the town folks, he doesn't get proper answer from Pilcher and slowly he realises that there is more to the town than that meets the eye, with a group of people, forming a team of their own, plotting to move away from the town, not knowing what lies outside the electrified fence. Towards the end of the story, Ethan, his family and several other town people, decide to make a break for the fence and having been told the reason why they were kept in a semi-captive state, free will becomes the dominant mind set and they decide to revolt against Pilcher, who switches off the power supply to the fence. The story ends with abbies growling and making their way into the town, brutalizing the last known humans, who were safe guarded as a specimen lot by Pilcher for over 2 millenia. Whether they survived the onslaught or did free will came at a cost which was unparalleled in human history forms the final part of the trilogy, "Lost town".

I am almost done with the third part. Will conclude the review in the next post.