Wow, that was intense.
The book begins with a car chase trying to retrieve the ‘Final Page’, which has been stolen, but then jumps 2 months forward into the story proper giving no explanation of what the ‘Final Page’ is, who the people were, or what events preceded it. I believe this is called foreshadowing — someone please correct me if i’m mistaken. But, whatever the literary device is called it’s certainly done with great effect. It throws you, head first, straight into the non stop action of this relentless book, which isn’t going to let you off its hook until you get to the end, and even then, it’ll leave you hooked on the next book in the series.
As we leave the enigmatic first chapter and begin to move through the book, more and more is slowly revealed. The various characters appear, which Colby does a wonderful job bringing to life, and it feels as much a character driven story as a plot driven one. All the characters are really good and well written.
And as the characters are revealed so is each of the various groups that they belong to within the world of the story. And then, within each group, sub-groups begin to appear, each with their own rivalries and agendas.
Thrown into the middle all of this is our protagonist, Ezekiel, who, along with her little sister, are simply trying to survive. But you really get the feeling that the only way of surviving the future that is coming to them is to join one of the many groups.
Getting to the end of the book and looking back: the whole book is mostly setting the stage and introducing the various characters and groups that i presume will be the basis of the story going forward, but it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s more to be added. It really is an incredibly complex and diverse dystopian future humanity has found itself in, but’s it’s never too complex to leave you confused — a very fine line that Colby walks incredibly well.
Final thoughts: i’m very much left looking forward to reading The Taken, but i just have a quick novella i pre-ordered and have been eagerly waiting to read to whizz through first. So yeah, i’ll definitely be back very soon with more of Ezekiel’s world.
Awesome!
Also available in Uprising: 12 Dystopian Futures.
Colby’s Page