My Five Word TL:DR Review : This didn’t work for me

I will start this review by stating upfront I don’t think I’m the target audience for this book.  Also, there are plenty of glowing reviews out there (although I would mention that a number of the 5* ratings seem to be by people who haven’t yet read the book – to quote Kai “interesting”!  I find this perplexing because to be fair I rarely request YA books these days but with all the favourable ratings I was practically seduced into requesting a copy.)  Anyway, moving swiftly on, this is a debut and I feel like this author has a lot of promise, but, I did have issues.

Instead of describing the plot I’m going to cut and paste the description:

‘She is the very thing he’s spent his whole life hunting.
He is the very thing she’s spent her whole life pretending to be.

Only the extraordinary belong in the kingdom of Ilya—the exceptional, the empowered, the Elites.
The powers these Elites have possessed for decades were graciously gifted to them by the Plague, though not all were fortunate enough to both survive the sickness and reap the reward. Those born Ordinary are just that—ordinary. And when the king decreed that all Ordinaries be banished in order to preserve his Elite society, lacking an ability suddenly became a crime—making Paedyn Gray a felon by fate and a thief by necessity.

Surviving in the slums as an Ordinary is no simple task, and Paedyn knows this better than most. Having been trained by her father to be overly observant since she was a child, Paedyn poses as a Psychic in the crowded city, blending in with the Elites as best she can in order to stay alive and out of trouble. Easier said than done.

When Paeydn unsuspectingly saves one of Ilyas princes, she finds herself thrown into the Purging Trials. The brutal competition exists to showcase the Elites’ powers—the very thing Paedyn lacks. If the Trials and the opponents within them don’t kill her, the prince she’s fighting feelings for certainly will if he discovers what she is—completely Ordinary.

Okay, my feelings reading this.

The writing shows a lot of promise in many ways.  However, this book is way too long for the actual story it delivers.  There is a lot of repetition and unnecessary bloating, the dialogue doesn’t really ring true and the plot and characters rely far too much on tropes.  On top of this, the story borrows very heavily from The Hunger Games (to such an extent that I initially thought it was maybe fanfic – perhaps it is?).

The characters.  I actually liked Pae in many ways.  She’s a survivor, she stands up for herself and shows a lot of pluck.  Kai, obviously the brooding, dark haired prince who is drawn to her as much as she is drawn to him (even though she has no love for the royalty and every reason in fact to actively dislike them) – well, he’s the mind candy of the piece but he didn’t have enough substance for me.  I felt like I was told he was a monster, a killer shaped by his father, the King, but I didn’t feel like there was anything menacing about him.  His half brother Kitt was quite interesting in that he has had a different upbringing being the heir.  He feels more naive in many ways and also comes across as a little frustrated with his lot in life.  I did find his devotion to his father a little unbelievable to be honest, especially given the love he has for his brother Kai who, let’s not mince words,.is treated very poorly by both parents.

The world building is a little weak for my personal tastes – which is also a surprise given the page count because there should be plenty of time for the history, culture, etc, to come across.  I felt like this element of the story was very flimsy.  To give a very brief outline about this setting.  Years ago a plague occurred, following which certain characters who survived had powers ranging from shapeshifting, disappearing, conjuring fire, causing hallucinations, etc.  Some of the survivors are much stronger than many of the others who gained powers and they’re known as the Elite.  The mundanes make up the rest of the population and have powers that are so weak as to be almost insignificant.  Those without powers are known as ‘ordinary’, they are believed to be diseased and on that basis any ‘ordinaries’ found are sentenced to death.  What is the purpose of the purge trials?  I could understand if ‘ordinary’ people were made to complete but it seems to be more a showcase for the elites.  Why would the ‘mundanes’ submit to trials that ultimately lead to death just for the aggrandisement of the powerful?  Given the competitiveness and the lack of any real motivation or reward why would the elites want to enter?  They can also die?  Why would you want to have your son or daughter join in?  It just doesn’t ring true for me.  This is the type of detail that when lacking frustrates me very much.  There would definitely be resentment.  And, I think, a lot more backstabbing and politics between the elite and the royals.  But, that’s a personal preference on my part after all.

Now, to the romance.  I would applaud the author for taking the time for the two main characters (Kai and Pae) to get to know each other.  And, for readers who enjoy the enemy to possible lovers trope this will undoubtedly work well.  There are plenty of scenes between the two, both as they try one upmanship on each other and make lots of threats with knives, etc.  But. Firstly, why the love triangle?  Why throw Kitt into the mix when it’s as plain as the nose on your face to everyone with even half an ounce of sense that the two only have eyes for each other?  Secondly, dear god, is anyone in this story actually aware of ‘personal space’.  The number of times that they accidentally, or purposefully, stumbled into each other resulting in hands on chests, waists, backs, hips, was just unbelievable, and, again, it doesn’t ring true especially as the two supposedly didn’t like each other, it was a bit cringey, it didn’t come across as sexy or scream chemistry to me.  Thirdly, why is ‘smirking’ such a big thing in so many stories where there’s romance involved.  I just feel like the work ‘smirk’ is greatly overused and I’ve always felt it was a bit of a mean thing to do – if you smirk at someone it feels condescending doesn’t it?  And there is a lot of ‘smirking’ going on here.  Okay, that’s a very small thing but once something like that gets stuck in your mind you can’t help noticing the repetition.  Anyway, in spite of the niggles, I will say that Pae and Kai’s relationship is interesting and where the story ends leaves a lot of potential for the next story.

I don’t want to be overly negative about this one.  It has a lot of positively glowing reviews and I think on this occasion it’s more of an ‘it’s me not you’ scenario, and also a case of going into the read with too high expectations, so if you’ve been fancying picking this one up then I certainly wouldn’t discourage you from doing so.

I received a copy through Netgalley, courtesy of the publisher, for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.

My rating 2.5 of 5 stars