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Review: Ruins (Partials #3) by Dan Wells

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Title: Ruins
Author:  Dan Wells
Publisher/Year:  Harper Collins 3/11/14
Length: 464 Pages
Series: Partials #3

Overview

Our time is almost up.

As the clock ticks closer and closer to the final Partial expiration date, humans and Partials stand on the brink of war. Caught in the middle, thousands of miles apart, are Samm and Kira: Samm, who is trapped on the far side of the continent beyond the vast toxic wasteland of the American Midwest; and Kira, now in the hands of Dr. Morgan, who is hell-bent on saving what’s left of the Partials, even if she has to destroy Kira to do it.

The only hope lies in the hands of the scattered people of both races who seek a way to prevent the rapidly escalating conflict. But in their midst appears a mysterious figure, neither human nor Partial, with solemn warnings of a new apocalypse—one that none of them may be able to avert.

The final installment in the Partials Sequence is a thrill ride of epic proportions, as the last remnants of life on our planet fight to determine its final fate.

My Thoughts

I feel like the plot lines of this final installment became more divergent (sorry for the wording here) – but that’s honestly a GREAT thing . When we left off in book 2, we were on 1 true journey, and maybe a 2nd sub story, but book 3 really makes things even more complicated and faster paced.

We learned that Kira and Samm made it to ParaGen in Denver and found that there was a civilization alive of humans that were able to successfully reproduce.  We also learned that it was due to the capture of 10 Partials who were harvested on an on-going basis for their blood/phermones which is the only cure to RM and a way to keep humans alive.

The question is, what is the cure to the Expiration date which is plaguing the Partials and killing them off?  If that wasn’t a strong enough plot line to stand on it’s own and to keep readers interested (i know that i would have been intrigued given all the medical and tech speak so far), there’s so much more going on.  There’s a division of people in East Meadow and even along the NY/CT border.  Partials are fighting Partials, Humans are not sure what to do, and during this, there are even bands of humans and Partials that are working together.

What i loved about this final installment is that we had learned a lot about The Trust in the first installments, but not about all of them.  in this book, we really learn a lot more about most – and there are interesting twists the whole way through.  when you think that you have discovered who one may be, you’re not necessarily right, and you’ll never understand their motivation or what side they were on since the Trust didn’t trust each other.

We go on the journey with Nandita and the girls who we learn are also not really human, and i still don’t know if we can trust Nandita and understand which side she’s on.  We continue on the journey of trying to figure out who Kira’s father was – and while we uncover that he was the leader of the Trust, we don’t know what his end goal was – and we’re not sure that we’ll ever know since no one knows where he is.  what we do find are Paritals that have even more gene mods than others had ever seen before, making them even more efficient killers and particularly dangerous – making things even more complicated for Kira and her gang.  At the same time, we continue to see human leaders go rogue and not in a good way.

All throughout this story, the big questions continue to be around whether the nuke will be detonated and what that will mean for the east coast.  We also wonder who’s going to survive – if the only baby that will live is Arwen or if Khan will live too and even if we’ll ever understand what’s going on with him.  What’s causing his disease since it’s not RM exactly.

it’s jam packed full of excitement, death unfortunately, but bonds form where they were never expected.  I really enjoyed this finale – and i think that it brought so many things to closure that we really needed to see.  While you lose hope during the book, and not all of it is restored since there’s a dark and ugly twist in everything, you get the closure that is to be expected and the wrap up of a story of survival and friendship.

What i really wanted to find out is how the love triangle/quadrangle would play out and i was a bit nervous for a long time while reading this.  Not only do we not know if Samm and Kira will ever be united again, we see the feelings come back up for Marcus and Kira when they cross paths eventually and that just makes things all that much more interesting.  Heron and Calix don’t leave Samm wanting for attention though – that’s for sure – and that makes the dynamic even more compelling to read.  Marcus’ comic relief throughout is also a great way to take things down the notch when necessary given the serious tone of most of the book.

All in all, very pleased with how the story progressed, and the path that it took us.  If only we could really see how things turned out after the last page – but,…..i guess that’s all to be in our imagination.  Now hopefully we don’t have to worry about things like all this happening in the next 50 years or so – which is when the story takes place  – but i guess we’ll never know.

Review: Partials (Partials #1) by Dan Wells

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Title: Partials
Author:  Dan Wells
Publisher/Year:  Harper Collins 2/26/13
Length: 472 Pages
Series: Partials #1

Overview

The human race is all but extinct after a war with Partials—engineered organic beings identical to humans—has decimated the population. Reduced to only tens of thousands by RM, a weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune, the survivors in North America have huddled together on Long Island while the Partials have mysteriously retreated. The threat of the Partials is still imminent, but, worse, no baby has been born immune to RM in more than a decade. Our time is running out.

Kira, a sixteen-year-old medic-in-training, is on the front lines of this battle, seeing RM ravage the community while mandatory pregnancy laws have pushed what’s left of humanity to the brink of civil war, and she’s not content to stand by and watch. But as she makes a desperate decision to save the last of her race, she will find that the survival of humans and Partials alike rests in her attempts to uncover the connections between them—connections that humanity has forgotten, or perhaps never even knew were there.

My Thoughts

If you know my tastes at all, you’ll know that a good mix of YA, Dystopia and Fantasy are right up my alley, and that’s what this first installment of the series does.  The other bit that i LOVE is that it’s centered around New York, so it gives me a more realistic sense of what’s going on.  Since it’s my ‘hood’ so to speak, i can really relate to things – and worry about what’s to come in the future.

What we have here is a story about the last living bits of humanity, as a result of a virus that was released that basically killed everyone off.  In addition to the story of survival and the quest to find a cure, there’s also the issue of other groups that are trying to kill off the humans.  there is The Voice which are humans, but rebels so to speak.  they don’t agree with what the government is doing and are fighting against it.  Then there are the Partials where were genetically modified and somewhat manufactured people that aren’t aging, that have ‘super powers’ in the sense that they are super strong and resilient to things. The thought is that Partials are responsible for RM – the virus that killed everyone off and that they may hold the cure.  At least that’s what our heroine Kira thinks.

This story takes us on the journey of Kira – a 16 yr old who has a lot going for her yet wants to solve the world’s problems.  She’s a medic for one, who has the curiosity to want to learn more, the love of her boyfriend Marcus who’s also a medic, and the close knit group of her adopted family. (since no one is true blood relation anymore aside from Madison and Jayden).

Kira works in the maternity ward, trying to figure out why newborns cannot survive.  they are born healthy but within a day or 2, RM takes over and kills them.  Kira thinks that the cure lies within the Partials and decides that they need to capture one to study and see if there’s a cure.  This is where things get dicey.

The question then becomes who will come with her, who will turn her in to the Senate, will things be easy, and is everything what it seems?  Of course, things are never straight forward, and this story takes us on the roller coaster of fear, survival, death, and perhaps a bit of optimism of what’s to come.  Can Kira find a way to save her friend’s baby and the future of the human race?  This becomes even more complicated when she starts to learn more about partials from Samm, the one that they capture.  She learns that maybe they aren’t all what they seem…..or are they?

I really enjoyed where this story took us.  I for one never fully trust anyone’s motives in stories like this, and we learn that you should always be wary in this first intro to the series.  There were twists that i wasn’t at all surprised about, granted Mr. Wells did hint at them throughout.  Where this story leaves us off as a lead in to the 2nd book is a nice cliff.  You’re left to wonder who’s still alive, how long they will live, and which groups are going to last or be split apart.  We know that Kira’s very strong minded and won’t sit back and take what people say and do to her.  The question is whether or not she can make a difference and if she can do it fast enough.  I’ll have to keep reading i suppose, in order to find out, but i’ll tackle that one shortly.  If you haven’t started the series yet, check it out.  I just saw that book 3 comes out next tuesday, so i have to read fast if i want to catch up in time for the release.  Enjoy!