Definitely stick with this 7-book series; I've already pre-ordered the last two still to come. Book 5 is a great continuation of the story of the ending of the world, with the caveats that although most people are apparently disposable, there are some who are "special," and somehow deserve to continue on - by design rather than through any particular efforts they've made over and above others. There are plenty of action and battle scenes, deaths, and the kinds of character interactions that make the story believable (love, affection, derision, grief, acceptance, annoyance...). There are also several WTF moments that can't really be understood entirely ever, but that's okay because life is like that sometimes. A couple of storylines started me to thinking what it would be like to be able to have another me to talk with, or to be able to see more clearly what I really did in my teenage years, since most of my memories are formed by little snapshots of the props and plots that were around me at some specific point in time. It made me admire and appreciate the process of creative writing that Johnny B. Truant and Sean Platt (and Dave too, sometimes) go through to give their readers (like me) some really deep material to dig through. I do wish I'd reread - at least - the previous book (Book 4) and maybe even the one before that. There were way too many times I couldn't remember what the story was referring to. I guess that would be a mild criticism of the writing --- that for lazy readers like me, it would be nice to have a few words added in once in awhile to remind us about the timeline.