Trigger warnings: Pandemic

6/10, I picked this interesting New Zealand sci-fi YA book hoping that it would be better than the last book I read and I tried to enjoy this but I simply didn't mainly due to the issues I found within this and I would pick this one up again, where do I even begin. It starts off with the main characters Violet Black and Ethan Wright, hence the title, and they just woke up from stasis in some sort of lab and I was initially confused but the book would explain more things later on. It turns out that there was a virus called M-fever that affected the entire world and killed so many people but the fact that the virus was an act of terrorism was unexpected. Soon enough they and some other characters are hired to join some secret organisation to stop the virus but it didn't really go to plan. The references to the other terrorist attacks like the one that happened 90 or 100 years ago from the time this book was set weren't needed. Also, Violet was quite aggressive in the book and for no reason she just accused some random people of lying but I don't know why. The last part and the ending of the book was underwhelming but I'm excited to read the next two books in the series. ( )

UPDATE 05/10/2022 - Reread and upgrading to a 3 as I listened to the audiobook and found it more enjoyable on the second read. Am moving on to book 2 in the series now. I stand by my instalove comments from my original review though.

CW: Death of loved ones, medical experiments, torture, kidnapping

ORIGINAL REVIEW

2.5 Stars

Well.

I personally believe when author's feel like they need to list the characters and how they connect to each other at the beginning of a book, it means someone has had a head scratching moment where they have said, "so who is that again?". This can be the result of any number of aspects in the story that haven't quite worked, such as underdeveloped characters, lack of world building to establish convincing contexts that Readers tie the characters to, or pacing issues. For me this novel had a brilliant and quite relevant concept but it wasn't anchored down enough. I understand the characters were very confused about what was happening so this made for quite a choppy reading experience as we were immersed into their confusion and fear. However, the result for me was a lack of connection with the characters and their plight. Also, I am not a huge fan of instalove at the best of times but this was way too fast to even make a little bit of sense. I did love the abilities that the teens developed and it's always great to read a book set in NZ. I can still see this having some appeal in the library and am happy to have a copy for YA Readers at the beginning of their reading journey.

Thank you to Turning Pages, Penguin Random House and Eileen Merriman for the free copy in exchange for an honest review. ( )