Born in a secure compound amidst the ashes of a world long dead, Claire Ainsley knows her place in the world: work her assigned job, live with her assigned husband, and keep her head down and her mouth shut. She knows what every compound resident has been taught: the world outside is a Wasteland, and the only thing more terrifying than leaving the compound is being forced to confront those who live outside-the ones left behind.

But her safe, contained life is destroyed when she narrowly survives an attack conceived by a conspiracy from within the compound itself. Only by fleeing into the terrifying Wasteland, a vast wilderness peopled by bloodthirsty, cannibalistic Wastelanders, can she escape a violent end at the hands of her fellow compound dwellers.

Captured by the very savages she feared, she is saved by John Madigan, a mysterious and capable survivor-and a Wastelander. She tries to deny the instant chemistry she feels with a man that is one moment terrifying, the next patient and caring, but eventually, neither of them are able to resist the blazing passion between them. But the Wasteland is harsh, and her time with John fleeting. As his own personal mission comes to an end, he must return to his homeland, leaving her with little choice but to learn to survive without the man whose protection is her only salvation in a harsh, uncompromising post-apocalyptic landscape.

The Wasteland of this world has not been kind to those unchosen.

The Wastelander is the first in a series of post-apocalyptic romance novels that follow Claire Ainsley and John Madigan as they navigate a dangerous world where lessons are brutally learned and love is challenged by hidden threats, political conspiracy, and the daily grind of survival.