Category Archives: Dystopian

Review: Youngbloods (Imposters #4) by Scott Westerfeld

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Title: Youngbloods
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Publisher/Year:  Scholastic Inc 4/5/22
Length:  432 pages
Series: Imposters #4

Overview

IT’S TIME TO

COME OUT OF HIDING

Frey has spent her life in a family of deceivers, a stand-in for her sister, manipulated at her father’s command. Free from them at last, she is finding her own voice — and using it to question everything her family stood for.

Tally was once the most famous rebel in the world. But for over a decade, she’s kept to the shadows, allowing her myth to grow even as she receded. Now she sees that the revolution she led has not created a stable world. Freedom, she observes, has a way of destroying things.

As the world is propelled further into conflict and conspiracy, Frey and Tally join forces to put a check on the people in power, while still trying to understand their own power and where it belongs.

My Thoughts

It’s been a minute since we’ve been with this series but it’s so easy to slip back into the series. Getting back into the world of Tally and Frey really leads us down an exciting path, and throughout this fourth book, we don’t know who to trust.

The journey here is one to watch how Frey tries to get over the loss of Col, the one person that she loved, knowing that it was her twin sister who murdered him. Frey doesn’t know who to trust since she knows that her sister isn’t loyal and is moral missing, so she has to tread carefully.

We get to watch the relationships grow with the Youngbloods and all the other cliques that were once part of the city – especially now that laws and dust aren’t a thing, an everyone’s got the chance to reinvent themselves. It’s a reliance on some of those old ‘friends’ that gets us through some of the trials in this storyline.

We see a ‘come to terms’ between Boss X and Frey and the realization that they are more similar than they thought, but have the same scars to get through life which make things harder. These similarities make it that much harder to predict what the future will hold with them since the dynamic is tough.

There’s a quest to uncover an destroy the old dust files that Frey/Rafi’s father had saved – knowing that there’s a lot there that the AI of other nations can use against them. Part of the issue of course is that they are radioactive so it’s harder to get to, and once they discover the hiding place, they learn that they’re not the only ones on this same quest. just for different motives.

Rarfi has made a trade, a deal with another nation without thinking through the repercussions and that means that we’re on the backfoot throughout the quest to save the world.and then when we realize that she perhaps made deals with multiple people, well that means that we have even more to worry about.

Even within the Youngbloods we see that there’s a power struggle on who’s making the right choices for them and for mankind that we don’t know who’s going to be on the right side of things.

There’s strife, stress, fear, angst….everything with the exception of romance since that’s been killed. But…all in all a great next chapter in their journey and in this series. Enjoy!

Review: Believe Me (Shatter Me #6.5) by Tahereh Mafi

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Title: Believe Me
Author: Tahereh Mafi
Publisher/Year:  HarperCollins Publishing 11/16/21
Length:  96 Pages
Series: Shatter Me #6.5

Overview

The devastatingly romantic fifth novella in the New York Times and USA Today bestselling Shatter Me series, chronicling the events after Imagine Me, the explosive sixth novel.

Juliette and Warner fought hard to take down the Reestablishment once and for all. Life in the aftermath isn’t easy, as they and their friends at the Sanctuary work with their limited resources to stabilize the world.

Warner has his sights set on more than just politics. Since he proposed to Juliette two weeks ago, he’s been eager to finally marry her, the person he loves more than anything and has endured so much to be with. But with so much chaos around them, it’s been nearly impossible for them to have a wedding. And even Juliette has been distracted by everything they need to do.

At long last, Warner and Juliette’s future together is within reach, but the world continues to try to pull them apart. Will they finally be able to be happily, officially, together?

My Thoughts

It’s been a minute since I was last with this series and i’ll never be able to truly sort out if/when we have gotten to the end of what our creative author has given us. In this novella, we are now past the worst of it we think – Ella/Juliette is alive and well, and she and Warner have a chance at their happy ending.

Of course though, you will remember (I hope?) from the last book that things didn’t end perfectly. While they were trying to clean things up to rebuild, destroying buildings that were deemed to be unsafe, Kenji followed ordered and knocked down a building….that housed the design studio that was making Ella’s dress. So…no wedding dress…GASP!

That of course sets the tone for everything in this novella. We watch how they try to make those arrangements work and well, they just don’t. The wedding gets postponed because the world is still so unsettled. We watch how there’s a need for Ella/Juliette to go out into the world, but Warner is so worried for her safety that he doesn’t let that happen. People pull them apart in every moment and direction and we wonder if they will ever get what they have waited so long for.

We want to believe that love will be enough for them, especially through all the books that we read about their start, middle and now ending? but….it seems like they will just have to wait until another moment in time because the need for order, and power, and unity is more important than romance.

So, as a reader, of course when I finished this book, I went online to see if there’s more to the story coming since if you’ll remember, it was intended as a trilogy that was extended. Well, it seems as though there’s nothing more planned, but the ending here hints at there being a need for more. Is that the game of Ms Mafi? leaving us on another cliff should she decide that she’ll continue the story – knowing that there’s more that we could get, or ….we are just left with an open ended ending? I don’t know and it’s going to bug me. But, it shouldn’t keep you guys from reading this one so…enjoy!

Review: Mirror’s Edge (Imposters #3) by Scott Westerfeld

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Title: Mirror’s Edge
Author:  Scott Westerfeld
Publisher/Year:  Scholastic 4/6/21
Length:  352 Pages
Series: Imposters #3

Overview

The danger rises and the deception grows in the heart-stopping third book in the New York Times bestselling Impostors series!

Frey’s return to the city of her birth isn’t going to be an easy one. She and her love Col must surge on new faces and bodies in order to infiltrate Shreve by dropping from the sky and landing undetected.

Frey’s sister Rafi — no longer a twin in features, but still a twin by birth — is the wild card. Are the sisters on the same side . . . or are they playing to their own agendas? If their father is deposed from Shreve, who will take control? And what other forces may be waiting in the wings?

My Thoughts

Here we are, back in the insanely engrossing world of the Uglies, where the past never truly led us in the right direction, and the semi truths of today aren’t what they seem. Everything that Frey thought she knew about Rafi and her father isn’t the truth, and that makes every move they make from here on out a question mark. The mission that this story takes us on is multi-pronged. There’s the need to rescue Boss X from the clutches of Schreve, and we don’t know what they will be up against. Frey goes under the knife with Col and several others to camo themselves from the nano dust in the city- creating new identifies for themselves in order ot sneak in, save X, destroy Shreve and hopefully free the city. The republic of Diego is in on this as well partially because that’s where the surg is happening and partially because the end game is for Diego to put Frey in control of Shreve and make the world a better place. The question though is are all the tests and prodding for the benefit of Frey, Shreve, Rafi or something else entirely.

The journey takes us under the radar into Shreve, under ground, where crims reveal secrets to Frey about her home city that she had no idea about. She’s introduced to cliques who may be able to set diversions so they can sneak into the high security prison where X is held, but since these are unknowns to the crew and rebels, we don’t know what’s the benefit and real truth here. Everyone has their own motivation and again we’re in a place where we don’t know who we can trust.

There’s eerie construction happening and we quickly uncover that there are radioactive deposits that Frey and Rafi’s father is looking to dig up in order to create a nuclear weapon. There’s intelligence that tells us that he’s stockpiled it in his tower meaning that they can’t blow him up with out destroying the city. So we’re at an impasse of sorts.

Relationships are put to the test, identities are uncovered and mysteries still hold strong where we don’t know what’s real, what’s illusion and what’s on the allied side.

Many lives are lost, and may twists takes us down a path where we realize that if you can’t fight for yourself, you can’t trust someone else to do it. We watch Rafi take Frey’s persona, her courage and her mannerisms and use them for her own benefit, yet again reminding us that she’s not to be trusted and that she’s only motivated by her own sense of power. We don’t know what that means for the rest of this story, since she’s done something yet again at the end of this installment that raises flags and questions that are impossible to answer.

We learned early on in this series of a death of a family member that was unknown at the time, and that’s been used against Frey and Rafi throughout the first three installments. We have a death of a favorite that was caused at the hands of someone that we were wrong to trust, changing the trajectory for our mains going into book four. We also find ourselves back in Paz at the end of this story, meeting with at least one if not two unexpected characters in the hopes that we can change the future for the better.

In my review for book two, I was left with some many philosophical questions – but in this book, it’s not so much a deep seeking question that I have but rather will we ever live in a time where over-baring power isn’t the only motivation? Where you always have to put someone else down in order to gain power, authority, money, all that comes with being in charge? We’ve seen that there’s a need and hunger for some people to lead, but there are also some who do it with a balance of respect. Sadly, that’s not the case in this story for some of the twisted paths we go down. There’s too much being sacrificed, and I wonder what that means should this story really transpire in the future. I can’t wait until book four now, and I hate how our author does this to me. Leaves me hanging on a cliff, and I have to wait far far too long for the next installment. oh well. Enjoy!

ARC Review: Complex by AD Enderly

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Title: Complex
Author:  A.D. Enderly
Publisher/Year:  Luminary Media 12/01/2020
Length:  594 Pages

Overview

The sky rains red, the poor are forgotten, governments have failed, and corporations have grown into mini nation-states called Complexes, where people flock to receive the security, shelter, and purpose the outside world can’t provide. The only payment required, buried somewhere in the twenty-thousand-page Terms of Service, is their freedom.

Now just sign on the dotted line…

Orphaned after her father’s death, 18-year-old Val’s focus is to protect her younger sister Kat and heed her father’s final wishes: Never, ever join a Complex. Stay away from them, at all costs, he demands.

But staying away becomes impossible when Kat is abducted, sparking a hunt through a violent megacity primed for revolution, where Val eventually discovers her sister’s disappearance is just a smokescreen. Beneath it lies a motive darker than death and broader in scope than a few lives.

As Val and her allies uncover the truth, they’re confronted with a terrible choice – save Kat, or save humanity?

My Thoughts

It took me a little while to start reading this one and then it took me even longer to finish it but I think there’s some interesting stuff happening in this story. First off I’d like to thank the folks at NetGalley for getting me a copy early even though I didn’t quite get to read it as early as I’d have liked.

We’re thrown into a world of the future, where the construct of society is that people are living in levels and tiers, based on either a social score, or the decision to sign their lives away in a contract to a Complex or Medical organization called Novagenica. No one really understands what the end result of any decision will be but they know that the struggle of life is real and there’s only a hope of what can make things better.

This story is written in books, although I don’t know that the books really make any sense or difference. Instead though we also get chapters that are each through the eyes of a different character, one who has a unique circumstance or role in society and we watch how it all slowly converges as we get to the end of this one.

We know that there’s a group of people who want complete control.

we know that there’s a virus that’s being developed to limit the population or potentially restructure the population in a way that will create a better more thriving society.

There’s also an aspect of AI that we see come to a head in a way that we all fear, even in current day.

There are groups of people who’s stories are more intertwined throughout this book. We see Val and Kat who are sisters who don’t have the same view on life and that just smells like disaster coming. Kat’s kidnapped and it makes everyone realize what’s important. The quest to find Kat leads Val to Trevor who becomes not only an integral part of the story but a love interest.

Trevor leads them to an organization that has a connection to tech and a desire for more power and that in turns leads them to their doom.

Dramatic yes, but I think that’s what this story is setting us up for. The thought that when you’re power hungry, bad things happen. When you are selfish bad things happen, and when you allow tech to gain too much strength, bad things will happen.

What’s interesting about this story though is the way that it ends. There’s a scene and a conversation that one of the main characters has with a ‘pastor’ of sorts, someone who’s proposition in life is that the idea of tech leads only to bad things, well, in that convo, there’s something interesting that happens. There’s a shift, a change in reality, and then the last note in the story is the notion that there’s more to come – and that someone like this pastor is the one who can help enact the change……driven by AI.

So…I left a lot out because frankly, there’s so much going on in parallel paths in this story that i’m not sure which story line is the most important. I’m also not sure what the real plot or point of this story is either – there’s just a lot of paths that merge and separate, bringing things to a head and then blowing them up. All in all, i’d have to say that this wasn’t My favorite book, but I know that there are folks out there who will love it for the ideas of what the future can look like if we don’t take precautions now. Enjoy!

Review: Imagine Me (Shatter Me #6) by Tahereh Mafi

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Title: Imagine Me
Author:  Tahareh Mafi
Publisher/Year:  HarperCollins Publishing 3/31/20
Length:  260 Pages
Series:  Shatter Me #6

Overview

Juliette Ferrars. Ella Sommers. Which is the truth and which is the lie?

Now that Ella knows who Juliette is and what she was created for, things have only become more complicated. As she struggles to understand the past that haunts her and looks to a future more uncertain than ever, the lines between right and wrong—between Ella and Juliette—blur. And with old enemies looming, her destiny may not be her own to control.

The day of reckoning for the Reestablishment is coming. But she may not get to choose what side she fights on.

My Thoughts

You know, it’s kind of weird thinking that we’ve come to the end of this series – all signs point to that being the case, although i’m sure there are spin-offs that we could get just like we had so much with Kenji, but that’s to be determined i guess. Anyhow, what i thought was a trilogy all those years ago has extended through so many additional installments and the journey that we’ve gone on with these characters has been so intense and complex that as a reader, i’ve had no choice but to dive in head first and see what happens next.

In this sixth book, we are with all of our loved characters, but in a form that’s not the same as previous books. We know that Anderson has a need for Ella/Juliette as a new host to Emmaline since she’s in a body that’s not strong enough for her and is dying, and the goal was always to put her into Ella’s body. Ella however is stronger than anyone ever expected, so even with the attempts for Emmeline to take over her body as a new host, we see a continued need to fight back. We come into this story with Ella in a destructive outburst all caused by her sister transferring powers to her and warner trying his best to keep her alive. While that’s happening, we see Kenji and Nazeerah explode at each other because of the confusion of their feelings for one another as well as their completely opposite views on everything.

If that’s a foreshadow for what we will see in this story – then it’s spot on. The journey that we go on in this final installment is wrought with fear, death, destruction, a loss of hope and a confusion on who is truly on what side.

We know that some of the Supreme kids have been taken hostage by Anderson and the parents, and the hope is that they can be retrieved safely, assuming that they are on the right side of things. At the same time there’s the need to protect the Sanctuary and all the kids that we know are on the right side of the right. All the while, trying to piece together what the future looks like. Warner and Ella were ina. great place, with an accepted proposal, and yet that’s torn from them quickly.

The way that this story is written, we spend a lot of time back in Oceania where Anderson has Ella and they have managed to begin the transfer, turning her into a devoted super soldier who only listens to what he demands of her. Knowing how strong Ella is though, we know that she’s not likely to go down without a fight and stop questioning things, and that’s exactly what happens. She’s confused to how she feels about Anderson now, she’s hearing voices in her head that she can’t quite put her finger on the origin, and she continues to have her own thoughts about things which contradicts all that she was expected to be able to do and yet completely on par with the Ella that we know.

We find ourselves at a cross road where Castle has to find a purpose in this new world, where Warner has to go find Ella since he’s not complete without her, where Kenji can’t let his best friend wither and die, where James is now without Adam and where Adam betrayed everyone. It’s a mess that’s not uncommon compared to what we’ve seen in prior books but still one that is far more complex than we’ve seen as well.

The questions that we’re forced to ask is whether there’s hope, whether there’s any chance that someone who was on the wrong side could be on the right side and help. Whether there’s any chance that the life and relationships that we’ve been fighting for over all these books can be something left standing at the end. I know that i’m not alone in praying for a happy ending, but i think that the ending that we get is not going to be the one that anyone was expecting. There’s no way for everyone to turn out the right side up and it’ll have to be some semblance of that to get us through this series. I don’t know how our amazing author does it, but she’s managed to give us one of the most dynamic stories of what the world could be all while giving us something to hold onto for the sake of love and friendship. So on that note, i’m sad to potentially be done with this series but i think you guys need to read it all….that is if you haven’t already. Enjoy!

Review: Brave New Girl (Brave New Girl #1) by Rachel Vincent

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Title: Brave New Girl
Author:  Rachel Vincent
Publisher/Year:  Random House Publishing 5/9/17
Length:  272 Pages
Series:  Brave New Girl #1

Overview

In a world where everyone is the same, one girl is the unthinkable: unique. A high-stakes fast-paced series launch from New York Times bestselling author Rachel Vincent.

Dahlia 16 sees her face in every crowd. She’s nothing special—just one of five thousand girls created from a single genome to work for the greater good of the city.

Meeting Trigger 17 changes everything. He thinks she’s interesting. Beautiful. Unique. Which means he must be flawed. When Dahlia can’t stop thinking about him she realizes she’s flawed, too.

But what if Trigger is right? What if Dahlia is different? But if she’s flawed, then so are all her identicals. And any genome found to be flawed will be destroyed, ONE BY ONE BY ONE. . . .

My Thoughts

I was looking for something different to read and I have to say that t here are times w hen good cover are really manage to get me sucked in. This cover though seems to remind me of something else that I’ve read over the years, I’m just not able to put my finger on what exactly yet.

Anyhow, just like the summary tells us, we are in a time when people are manufactured based on genomes, with the intention to make the best of the best for an entire generation of sorts. Essentially 5,000 girls and 5,000 boys in each year, created for a specific purpose. No one knows exactly what, but that’s part of the intrigue.

we follow Dahlia 16 from the time she was Dahlia 6 i think until now, when she’s grown, she’s showing traits of being the best in her age group and she’s got pride for that – she’s competitive and proud. Yet, that’s a problem since the genomes are developed so that there’s no competition, that no one feels better than anyone else. When she’s recognized for her gardening ability, the way that she’s able to grow better fruits and vegetables faster and of better quality than almost anyone else. That’s when things go in a different direction for her. She’s called to the management bureau and there she’s given the proposition of being an instructor, which is an interesting proposition for her. It means that she wont’ go into the work force like her identicals, but it’s a prestige role. On her way out of the office though, if she felt that her life hadn’t changed enough, she gets stuck in an elevator with a cadet. Trigger17 and that is what throws her path completely off.

Trigger17 is the best in his cadet class, and that’s allowed since Defense personnel are supposed to have competition and pride. When there’s an immediate attraction between the two, and we know that Dahlia’s not supposed to talk to anyone, we can only imagine what is going to happen next.

The balance of the story is intense. We watch how these two can’t stay away from one another, but they know that it’s too dangerous to be together. They also find out more about Dahlia’s history and make-up which completely changes everything that we knew. We’re left on such a cliff hanger of sorts seeing how things have evolved and the trouble that’s occurred. There are mass killings, hope is lost, fugitives, an entirely unknown society and town. Everything that people knew from Lakeview their town proves to be something completely different.

I’m excited to see where this story goes since we’re now in a completely different place both physically and mentally than where we started and this means that there’s an opportunity to see these teens grow and learn things for themselves. We don’t know who we can trust and who’s going to go against us. There are so many questions and so few answers to this point, but the notion of the wild, freedom, and teen romance is enough to keep this story going at full speed. Enjoy!

Review: The Revolution of Ivy (The Book of Ivy #2) by Amy Engel

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Title: The Revolution of Ivy
Author:  Amy Engel
Publisher/Year:  Entangled Publishing 11/03/16
Length:  202 Pages
Series:  The Book of Ivy #2

Overview

Beyond the fence. I am still alive. Barely.

My name is Ivy Westfall. I am sixteen years old and a traitor. Three months ago, I was forced to marry the president’s son, Bishop Lattimer—as all daughters of the losing side of the war are sold off in marriage to the sons of the winners. But I was different. I had a mission-to kill Bishop.

Instead, I fell in love with him.

Now I am an outcast, left to survive the brutal savagery of the lands outside of civilization. Yet even out here, there is hope. There is life beyond the fence. But I can’t outrun my past. For my actions have set off a treasonous chain of events in Westfall that will change all of our fates—especially Bishop’s.

And this time, it is not enough to just survive…

My Thoughts

The path that this story has taken is a sad but expected one. If you recall from the first book, we are living at a time where nuclear war has ‘destroyed’ America, likely the planet, and there are only small groups of people assumed to be living in communities spread out all over the place. We are in Westfall, somewhere i’d guess in the middle of the country, a town that was established and founded by the Westfall family but where leadership and governance is by the Lattimers. In the first book, Ivy was forced to marry Bishop, a Westfall marrying a Lattimer, but what no one expected and understood is that Ivy and Bishop are not at all like their families, so what society hoped would happen is the polar opposite.

We saw the relationship develop and solidify between Bishop and Ivy in the first book, however there was the underlying threat that we were aware of, that Ivy’s sister and father had this master plan to kill Bishop, then his father and then to take control of the city. Ivy had always followed what she was told because she didn’t know better, secrets were kept from her that she didn’t even know existed, and when she’s with Bishop and her eyes are opened up, she quickly realizes that life is very different and she’s been given the gift of freedom and ability to see what’s real on her own.

Along with this though comes the issue that she’s been tasked to kill Bishop and she’s some how fallen in love with him. So to save him, at the end of the first book, we see her sacrifice herself which ultimately turned into her being put out of the community, to the other side of the fence, with the intent for her to die. Ivy however will not die.

The journey in this second book is one of self discovery, seeing through Ivy’s eyes what it takes to survive, to become your own person and to live by making your own opinions and thoughts, not living by what others tell you. Trust and Loyalty are the only things that matter outside the fence and that’s something that’s hard for her.

On her quest to freedom, she of course almost dies, injuries from her release, the return of a man who was put out for raping a young girl chooses to attack Ivy as well, and she’s left for dead. When she’s discovered by Caleb and Ash, two people who’ve lived their whole life outside the fence, we see the story start to turn, and we have hope. She’s able to find friends, shelter, food, and family. That’s something that she thought she had with Bishop but that’s a life that’s gone. Or is it?

I really enjoy how our author paces this story – there’s so much growth and turmoil that happens that we get to see how that develops and then when the dust starts to settle, new challenges arise. The biggest of course is the return of Bishop. We know how he felt about Ivy, and we know that he didn’t truly believe that she was going to kill him, so it’s no surprise that he turns up, but the question becomes what will that mean for everyone.

Why is he outside the fence? What did he do and what does that mean? Will he and Ivy be the same since we know that they have both changed, and we know that Ivy has put up walls against him. What does all this mean for Westfall, and of course what’s going on with Ivy’s sister and Father?

All of these are questions that we beg to have answered in this story, and of course they all are. I think that the way this story resolves itself is realistic yet a bit quick. but i think that’s what it calls for. I can tell you that not everyone that we have read and endeared ourselves to survives, and that’s ok since that’s life. But i can tell you that story lines are tied up and we see what the present looks like. I’m sad this is a 2 book series v. a trilogy so now i have to find a new story to dive into. Enjoy!

Review: The Book of Ivy (The Book of Ivy #1) by Amy Engel

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Title: The Book of Ivy
Author:  Amy Engel
Publisher/Year:  Entangled Publishing 11/11/14
Length:  227 Pages
Series:  The Book of Ivy #1

Overview

What would you kill for?

After a brutal nuclear war, the United States was left decimated. A small group of survivors eventually banded together, but only after more conflict over which family would govern the new nation. The Westfalls lost. Fifty years later, peace and control are maintained by marrying the daughters of the losing side to the sons of the winning group in a yearly ritual.

This year, it is my turn.

My name is Ivy Westfall, and my mission is simple: to kill the president’s son—my soon-to-be husband—and return the Westfall family to power.

But Bishop Lattimer is either a very skilled actor or he’s not the cruel, heartless boy my family warned me to expect. He might even be the one person in this world who truly understands me. But there is no escape from my fate. I am the only one who can restore the Westfall legacy.

Because Bishop must die. And I must be the one to kill him…

My Thoughts

I’m a fan of this genre, looking into the future when we know that man kind will wipe out society as we know it, and when things return back to what it was like before technology, with different rules in place to keep peace, it makes you realize that maybe we’re all going to be lost and up a creek without a paddle if that day ever comes.

So we start this story in a point that’s roughly 10 years into the future from where we are now, which is kind of scary. Nuclear war has wiped out much of America, and there are so few people left that we know of because of what happened, and that means that there are only a few left to live in a town that was itself once divided.

There was war in this town to determine how it would be run, some were for democracy and some were for one ruler who was president and set the laws. That side one, and what it means is that there are families who draw a line in life. As a result of this divide, there’s a tradition that every year olds marry someone from the other side in the hopes that war will be avoided since it means that everyone would be warring with their loved ones, and there’s hope that marrying people off at a young age will allow for a higher chance to have more children who are healthy and can revive the country.

The president’s son has managed to delay his marriage because he’s the President’s son, but as such, he has to marry the daughter of the founder of the losing side. The irony here is that the Westfalls, the losing side, have a daughter that’s the same age as Bishop, but he delays his marriage to wed the younger daughter. As we all know, it’s always the younger daughter that’s been the spare in life, and that means that her value is unexpected, undervalued, and well, everyone thinks she’s less worthy. Everyone except for Bishop. We learn his motivation later in the story and it gives you hope.

Ivy is our leading lady, sixteen and forced to marry a man she doesn’t know, whom she hates because of who he is and what his family has done to hers, and at the same time, there are pieces of this tradition that give her freedom. That get her away from what her father and sister have been forcing her into, and gives her the opportunity to grow her own wings.

Bishop is the son of the President, a boy that everyone looks to as the future of society, and a boy who has different feelings on how things should be than his father, but he’s biding his time so that he’s able to make changes.

The development of their relationship is on par with what we see in other stories in this genre. Bishop isn’t what we expected and as such, he gives Ivy time to adjust, gives her a chance to get comfortable with him, to let some type of relationship grow and develop and hopefully make it into a marriage that’s more than in just name only.

The challenge here though is that Ivy’s family has revenge in their minds. They want to take power back from Bishop’s family and the only way to do that is for Ivy to kill Bishop and then for her father and sister to kill the President and take power over. The journey that we go on here is one where we hope there’s a way to change minds, or to avoid doing things that will go too far, but we also know that will never happen.

There are similarities of this story and several others though where there’s a fence that surrounds their community. The fence is the edge of civilization, and outside of that is deemed unsafe, uninhabitable and that’s where they put people out who break laws. From what we’ve seen in other stories, there’s far more out there than anyone knows, and it’s far more civilized, but that’s not for book 1 i don’t think.

What we worry about here though are the hopes and dreams that both Ivy and Bishop share. They both crave to know what’s out there, to see the ocean and to be free. That means that some how we know that they will go outside the fence but we don’t know the circumstances and if they will succeed, survive etc. What we do know though is that this story lets us off at the fence. One on one side and one on another, with limited hope of resolution or success. Too much is at stake for anyone to go against beliefs, but too much is at stake to sit and do nothing.

So on that note, i can’t wait to get into the second book here since i’m really curious how things will turn out. People are planting ideas, people are planting lies, and those who are in power are abusing it for their own worth. I can’t wait to see what’s next. Enjoy!

Review: Reveal Me (Shatter Me #5.5) by Tahereh Mafi

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Title: Reveal Me
Author:  Tahereh Mafi
Publisher/Year:  HarperCollins Publishing 10/8/19
Length:  68 Pages
Series:  Shatter Me #5.5

Overview

This fourth companion novella to Tahereh Mafi’s New York Times bestselling Shatter Me series is narrated by fan favorite character Kenji Kishimoto!

The explosive revelations in Defy Me have left readers reeling and desperate for answers. This fourth and final novella in the series will bring readers back to the world of the Shatter Me before the final novel installment hits shelves in winter 2020.

My Thoughts

The summary here doesn’t do anything for the story – you really have no idea what it is that we’re going to walk into, especially knowing that we were left with some INSANE revelations in the last book. Whatever it was that they thought they knew about each other, about the Resistance, about what it was that Anderson had tried to do, well the story is far more complex. Adam and James are pawns just like Ella and Emmaline are. Warner is caught in the middle again as are everyone else and it’s a mess.

As you’ll remember, they had safely made it across the country to Castle’s daughters complex. A place that no one knew existed because no one knew she existed and it’s a sanctuary to recoup and figure out what the next move will be. Told from Kenji’s point of view, we see how this will play out.

Remember that he was drugged and kidnapped by Nazeera (who could still be playing both sides) and then his plane is shot down by the Resistance to get him to safety. All part of a plan that he wasn’t informed about.

The biggest thing here is that you know that Kenji is driven by emotions and that’s part of his powers. He’s able to put others at ease, but what happens too is that he’s doing that by not letting his emotions take hold of him. We haven’t seen what would happen if he can’t control that and there are moments in this novella that we come close.

Because Kenji is so invested in his friendships, in his relationships, he’s the one that takes the latest rounds of information the hardest. Adam and James didn’t come with them from Omega Point and that can’t bode well for their futures because we learned who their father is and that makes things dicier. Kenji’s emotions bottle up and then explode when he learns of their fate and that takes the story on a fast turn of anger, fear and distrust.

Add to that the feelings that he had for Nazeera at one point, and the fact that he doesn’t know what her motivations are. This turns quickly into a love / hate relationship and while i would love nothing more than to see them together, we don’t yet know what’s possible.

When things seem like they can’t get worse – they’re in hiding from Anderson (shocker – he’s not dead), Adam and James are in limbo. No one knows who to trust, what their futures will hold and who’s going to be able to save them. Juilliete and Warner are finally in a good place but will that last? Will anyone find happiness and what will the world look like when this all comes to a head.

The last scene is an intense one brought to us via screams from the sanctuary, the world changing physical structure and form, the sun becoming something that no one understands, and Julliette on her knees screaming her sisters name. All of this begging for questions to be asked on what’s to come next, and now we have to wait a few months to see how this plays out. I don’t know if i can be patient but i guess i have no choice. Enjoy!

Review: Rebel (Legend #4) by Marie Lu

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Title: Rebel
Author:  Marie Lu
Publisher/Year:  Roaring Book Press 10/1/19
Length:  332 Pages
Series:  Legend #4

Overview

Respect the Legend. Idolize the Prodigy. Celebrate the Champion. But never underestimate the Rebel.

With unmatched suspense and her signature cinematic storytelling, #1 New York Times–bestselling author Marie Lu plunges readers back into the unforgettable world of Legend for a truly grand finale.

Eden Wing has been living in his brother’s shadow for years. Even though he’s a top student at his academy in Ross City, Antarctica, and a brilliant inventor, most people know him only as Daniel Wing’s little brother.

A decade ago, Daniel was known as Day, the boy from the streets who led a revolution that saved the Republic of America. But Day is no longer the same young man who was once a national hero. These days he’d rather hide out from the world and leave his past behind. All that matters to him now is keeping Eden safe—even if that also means giving up June, the great love of Daniel’s life.

As the two brothers struggle to accept who they’ve each become since their time in the Republic, a new danger creeps into the distance that’s grown between them. Eden soon finds himself drawn so far into Ross City’s dark side, even his legendary brother can’t save him. At least not on his own . . .

My Thoughts

OH.MY.GOODNESS. Thank goodness we got to re-enter the story here with Day and June because they had major unfinished business in the epilogue of book 3 and there was no way that fans were going to be ok with that ending. Knowing that our amazing author Ms Lu was busy writing another story (which was also amazing), I was patient and that patience paid off.

We enter this story about ten years in the future. Day (Daniel) and his brother Eden are living in Ross City in Antarctica. The most advanced new country in the world – a society based on Virtual Reality, a Level system to keep you in classes, and as a result, a society that’s both thriving and failing at the same time. If we learned anything from the Republic, we know that there will be unrest and that will result in the wrong people coming into power and that will result in a catastrophe.

That wrong person is our main villian here – Dominic Hann – the man who rules the Undercity – the portion of Ross City that’s made up of people who don’t have levels high enough to survive. They can’t get medication, they can’t get food and shelter and they can’t aspire to be anything more.

The story we have here is one told in alternating chapters between Daniel and Eden. They are brothers who at the core love each other, but who have such different views on life because of their experiences in the past. Daniel wants nothing more than to protect Eden, and Eden wants to live his life. It’s that ‘living’ that gets them into trouble. Eden is noticed by Dominic while in the Under City and that means that he’s on a radar for skills. Skills that we were seeing in the previous books – his innate knowledge of tech and computers and his ability to make things that others can’t. That’s something that he thrives in here in Antarctica and he’s actually scored an internship back in the Republic because of what he can do. The challenge though is that his interaction with Dominic means that nothing will come to pass as it should.

Daniel on the other hand is now part of AIS which is a government agency. Like the FBI or CIA. he’s there to keep order, to hunt criminals and to protect the president. That’s one thing that he has in common with June as she’s in the Republic to protect Anden still. He is hunting Hann and when his brother gets mixed up in that gang, things get dicey.

Now back to June. The last we saw of her and Daniel was back in the epilogue of the last story. Daniel’s memory had been wiped because of illness and intervention and he didn’t have any sense of what June was to him anymore. Devastating!!! June knew that was a likely occurrence when she agreed to help him get treated, meaning that sh was going to sacrifice her love and future, which inevitably they both did. The great thing about their love story though is that even without the clear memories, Daniel still knew that June was special and this fourth installment lets us see how that plays out.

So you can imagine the excitement that we have in this story. We have the Utopia society come crumbling down because of interactions with the under city and Dominic Hann. (thank you Eden for being such a genius) and we have the potential to see romance rekindled. Add to that breaking laws, fleeing to the Republic and being back as square one where it all began. Watching governments struggle and society crumble. Far too many people die in this story and far too many truths are found to be lies.

But on the flip side, we see new relationships form, new alliances taking shape, we see the future for what it can be and that’s something that’s amazing. This is the closure and finale that this story truly needed and i’m THRILLED that Ms Lu finally got to finish it. Enjoy!