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  • Surviving the Fall Box Set

  • The Complete Surviving the Fall Series, Books 1-12
  • Written by: Mike Kraus
  • Narrated by: Chris Abernathy
  • Length: 29 hrs and 46 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (64 ratings)

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Surviving the Fall Box Set

Written by: Mike Kraus
Narrated by: Chris Abernathy
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Publisher's Summary

The critically acclaimed Surviving the Fall series, now in one complete edition!

Surviving the Fall is an epic survival/thriller post-apocalyptic series that asks the "what if" question that lurks in the back of everyone's mind.

When a devastating attack cripples and destroys every Internet-connected device in the country, Rick Waters is stranded a thousand miles from his wife, Dianne, and their children. To get back home, he'll have to draw on every survival instinct he has as he's pulled into a web of lies and conspiracy that threaten not just his survival but that of the entire world.

Surviving the Fall is a thrilling post-apocalyptic episodic series that focuses on Rick and Dianne Waters and how they each deal with the apocalypse. Stranded across the country away from his family, Rick must travel from California to Virginia to reunite with his wife and children, all while struggling to comprehend and deal with the horrors along the way.

At home with her three children when she experiences the beginning of the end in a dramatic and deadly fashion, Dianne Waters has experience as a prepper and survivalist, but not even years of training and preparation have readied her for the darkness that comes with the end of the world. Now she must draw upon those skills to protect her loved ones and fight back against those who come against her and her family.

This complete edition of Surviving the Fall features all 12 books in the series, each one full of action, suspense, and drama, as Rick and Dianne struggle to survive the end of days.

©2017, 2018 Mike Kraus (P)2019 Mike Kraus

What listeners say about Surviving the Fall Box Set

Average Customer Ratings
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Very well done. I binged through all the books!!

well written, exciting and great narrating! Thank you!! This would be a great TV series!

3 people found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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Cheesy survival story

If this book was turned into a movie it would be a cheesy SHTF one. The main character manages to find a pistol, shotgun and rifle on the first day. The main character’s voice is super annoying. After having read “One Second After” I was looking for another similar SHTF survival type of movie. This one was a big disappointment.

2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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  • CK
  • 2019-09-12

Story is fine.. the voice acting is terrible

I can imagine that its not an easy task to read a story out loud and bring the characters to life through intonation, pacing, etc. The narrator of this story, Chris Abernathy, however, is just awful. I will make a point of never buying another audio book that he narrates. The Russian accent makes me want to gouge my eyes, out and the way he portrays the male protagonist, where he lowers his voice to make him sound tougher is beyond ridiculous. The story was fine, but it was a struggle to finish, because of Abernathy.

1 person found this helpful

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Fabulous!

The characters were believable, their challenges were believable and exciting.All the characters storylines were wrapped up well.Now I like to see a series from Mike Kraus on how they all rebuild this new world.

1 person found this helpful

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Realistic endeavor

I love how you follow both the mom and the father's distinct journey. They take logical and realistic decisions and what happens to them is believable.

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Great series

I throughly enjoyed this series, “Surviving the Fall”. Each book builds on the ones before keeping the audience’s interest. The well crafted characters draw you into the storyline. The storyline flows smoothly and quickly with action, drama, twists and turns, romance and suspense. Overall this is a well written series and has become one of my favourite post-apocalyptic stories.

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Falls flat

This story has everything you need for a good listen...except fully rounded characters.

None of the characters have any emotion. They go from living their normal lives one day to killing people the next and have no reaction. It is truly bizarre.

There should be so much tension as Rick crosses the country to get home to his family and there just isn’t.

Diane appears to be GI Jane and is blessed with THE most obedient kids EVER. They don’t whine, complain or ask where dad is. They don’t even seem curious about the state of the world. Again, bizarre.

There are a few chapters where big action is taking place but then it seems like the author gets bored and skips the end of it, suddenly they are safe again and we hear what happened by them talking about it.

If you are looking for something to listen to while doing other tasks, cleaning, walking, whatever, this is fine but you won’t be on the edge of your seat, ever. The characters feel no emotion and as a result, I can’t connect with them.

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Not worth it

Meh. Needs a good editor. Not very believable. The narrator is not very good at interpreting the characters, and his accents are awful.

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great read could not put this down

loved it couldn't put this series of books down on to the next series by this author

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Excellent

this is an excellent read and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a fast pace

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  • Kelsy
  • 2019-08-12

Diane, stop smiling at everyone all the time

Yes, we know you love your kids, but your face must hurt by now. Also, it makes a character super flat when they only have one reaction to someone else.
As the books got further and further into the story, I began to notice more and more repetition of words in the same sentence or paragraph. This is sloppy writing and is usually fixed in the second draft. This quick turnaround episodic type of writing had no second draft, just the first with all the spelling errors taken care of.
Everyone spoke the same, and not just because the narrator was not a five star narrator. The author was writing the movie he was watching inside his head and it was a B rated movie.
If the saying "show don't tell" was a book, this would be it, a 100 times over.
All the characters annoyed me. I found myself "rolling my eyes" all the time. I wanted to "interject myself into the conversation" with the author and tell him he wasn't writing real people, just strange cardboard props. "A high rate of speed", "descend upon them(upon?)", and so many more phrases that are repeated by all the characters, all of them, and also said in the narrative. Ugh.
Every bad guy was out of some nineties movie. Who were they before? Did they become a**holes with the freedom of the apocalypse, or where they always a**holes who were just waiting for the chance to rape, enslave, and murder? None of them were emotionally intelligent, they all had anger issues, they were all stupider than the "good guys".
The good guys also had great luck. Super, amazing good luck.
Jane, oh Jane. Did you have a purpose in this story? Were your helpful ideas really all that valuable to Rick the Wise Leader? Or were you just alive to show how normal people are so stupid? To ask Rick questions like you are an uncertain teenager? "Um guys, do you see what I see?" "What?" "Is it just me or is the sky blue?" Rick leans forward as he releases the gas a bit. "You're right Jane, it is blue. Good job on catching that." What would I do without this no-backstory Jane who has no skills, probably didn't have a job worth anything because it's not mentioned, can't contribute except to boost my ego and to be annoyingly youthful and ignorant. What would I do? Probably do everything the same if she wasn't present. Nothing would change if she had never been born. Nothing. Poor Jane.
Okay, so one last thing: how old is everyone? We know the kids ages and I assume Rick and Diane are in their thirties, but everyone else? Jane I assume is fourteen, the doctor scientist guy is either 45 or 65. 35 to 80 is my guess for Tina, Jason, and Sarah.
Oh wait, not the last thing. WHERE IS EVERYONE? WHERE DID THEY ALL GO? THERE ARE MILLIONS OF PEOPLE IN THE USA AND YOU'VE BEEN CROSSING THE ENTIRE COULTRY SO IT'S NOT LIKE THEY ARE JUST CHILLING IS RED CROSS CAMPS CONVENIENTLY IN ALL THAT STATES YOU DIDN'T PASS THROUGH. WHERE ARE THEY?
I think that's the real story. Obviously, there's been an alien invasion where 327 million people are now slaves being probed. The aliens clearly didn't want to abduct the biggest a**holes so that's why they are left on earth. Looking at you Diane and Rick.

36 people found this helpful

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  • jayne stevens
  • 2019-06-24

Never Worked So Hard To Try To Like A Book

From now on, I look to see who is narrator before I get a title. Chris Abernathy makes me crazy. I couldn't tell if the story was any good for trying so hard to NOT become irritated with the narration. Monotone mostly, but when he did put a little life in his voice it was in the weirdest places. I really tried to finish this, but realized I was wasting my life and just had to stop.

36 people found this helpful

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  • reader
  • 2019-01-23

HYPOCRITES

What is it with this genre? It's the same premise every time: the husband is stranded far away from his family when SHTF and he must get back to them - because after all, they prepped and so they're better than you. I got to chapter 18 before the wife out and out murdered a guy with her laser and strobe light rifle - because he stood next to her barn with a pea shooter (in his pocket) asking for food. She then rationalized it to herself and to her kid that she HAD to kill that guy, even though all he said was that he was hungry. He was doing exactly what her husband was doing five states away - going around trying to scrounge to stay alive. How ironic that if the husband would have encountered someone just like his own wife - he'd have been shot on sight. But "as Christians," they were blessed because they prepped - and darn it, they deserve to kill hungry people. The thought of sharing food with the hungry man never occurred to the wife - just putting five bullets in his chest. Even stupid novels like this matter because they reinforce the profound hypocrisy and fraudulent righteousness that religious people practice but don't seem to recognize.

36 people found this helpful

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  • Sandie J 36
  • 2019-07-04

Did not like this book-set...

Way too much swearing. Even the grandmother was using strong words. Story content was good.

30 people found this helpful

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  • chadjason
  • 2019-01-24

This could have been great, but it is not.

I wanted to like this post-apocalyptic series, but it is just not a finished work. I mean it proceeds like something that was written in haste and without any actual experience or research. I made it as far as Rick leaving the company of the Military, then I had to quit. I found that the story just made me mad because I wanted to rewrite nearly every single part of it. Not to mention the abysmal telling by Chris Abernathy, more on that at the end of this review.

The two main characters, Rick and his wife (don’t remember her name because the 3 kids just call her mom), conveniently have just enough experience and knowledge to get by on their own, but their common sense, something one desperately needs to survive in a post- apocalyptic world, is nearly completely missing. If you can listen to the part about going into town for the first time and find it even remotely believable, then you must not know any mom’s or not have kids of your own. It is stupid to put it bluntly.

The story plays out like a video game, the characters have to solve one problem at a time and conveniently find what they need. How Rick manages to traverse across several states and only run into a handful of people is laughable. Are we to believe that 99% of all people just stayed at home, walked single file to a shelter or died? Please.

The parts that really got to me was Rick’s interaction with the Military. There is no part of it that is believable. I was a lower enlisted that spent 90% of my time working at the Brigade and Corps level. I interacted with every rank from 1 Star General down. Officers and enlisted alike don’t act or talk the way they are written in this story. Not only is it infuriating, it is disrespectful.

The entirety of what I listened to, 7 hours and 41 minutes, leads me to believe that Mike Kraus got the itch to write this after watching a bunch of movies and doing a little research online. Good writers write what they know. Writing about topics outside your wheelhouse is risky at best and outright tragic in cases like this.

If I never hear the “name” kiddo again, it will be too soon. How am I to believe that a mom would have only 1 pet name for all of her children. Kiddo is a name you would hear coming from a long lost uncle or acquaintance. So irritating.

Chris Abernathy reads this story like he is getting paid by the minute. He…..is…..so…..frustratingly…..slow. I listened to this at 1.3 the normal speed just to keep from pulling my hair out. And the gravely voice he chose for Rick, the computer nerd, is confusing. Only hard living or screaming will give you a “gargling asphalt” voice.

I wish I could have those hours back.

27 people found this helpful

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  • brian avila
  • 2019-02-05

This author should stick to writing children’s books.

If you are going to write about something you should understand your subject matter. Stick to stories that don’t involve prepping, firearms, fighting,gangs, hiking..... just go write vampire romance.

15 people found this helpful

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  • Acostumer
  • 2020-01-09

Believe the bad ratings. Don’t trust box sets

Before you read my tire rate really look into the reviews before getting this book please really look into them the bad reviews explain a lot more detail than the good ones put that in the SPECT of before getting it.......I looked at this book for a week before getting it going through all the reviews and noticing that the bad reviews explained more detail than all the high praises. I couldn’t stand the book I finished the first book and got halfway through the second one until I had to call and get my token back.This book is like if someone took a Syfy channel B-movie and put less effort into it all the characters followed the tropes of a survival series. The ridership took more time to give people more depth instead of the 80s action heroes. The main character is a tech dude but they are reader makes him sound like a chain smoking clean Eastwood when the guys only post to be in his 30s he’s not in his 80s and A IT person I mean probably a little more of a whiny her voice or a younger voice not an 80-year-old chain smoker everyone else is blender then dirt I’m going to rephrase this again even though reading my tire rate probably makes not a lot of sense This book should be free that’s how it should be handled with Audible then I think a lot of people actually put effort into it

13 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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  • Rob Oswald
  • 2019-06-14

Gas just dumping from the fuel tank?

I have been a mechanic for many years and have never seen gas just get vented from the tank no such valve

10 people found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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  • Coty B.
  • 2019-03-27

bad set up.

the story is missing a lot of elements like segways and poor character background, however the narrator is great as always. a lot of character development needs to be expanded. overall the book series seems rushed.

9 people found this helpful

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    2 out of 5 stars
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  • Lisa G.
  • 2019-07-22

Started off strong...

But half way thru I was having to force myself to finishing. The narrator would have been a lot better if he hadn’t given the main character such a weird voice...it was super annoying. The story was very predictable and had me rolling my eyes a lot. The author’s voice updates at the end of each book were so unnecessary ...it was like he was trying to either apologize for writing the book or trying really hard to convenience us to go on to the next. I ended up skipping most of the husbands story and just listening to the wife’s story...hers was so much more enjoyable.

5 people found this helpful