Book Review: The Legacy Human by Susan Kaye Quinn

 

Goodreads Summary: What would you give to live forever?
Seventeen-year-old Elijah Brighton wants to become an ascender--a post-Singularity human/machine hybrid--after all, they're smarter, more enlightened, more compassionate, and above all, achingly beautiful. But Eli is a legacy human, preserved and cherished for his unaltered genetic code, just like the rainforest he paints. When a fugue state possesses him and creates great art, Eli miraculously lands a sponsor for the creative Olympics. If he could just master the fugue, he could take the gold and win the right to ascend, bringing everything he's yearned for within reach... including his beautiful ascender patron. But once Eli arrives at the Games, he finds the ascenders are playing games of their own. Everything he knows about the ascenders and the legacies they keep starts to unravel... until he's running for his life and wondering who he truly is.

The Legacy Human is the first in Susan Kaye Quinn's new young adult science fiction series that explores the intersection of mind, body, and soul in a post-Singularity world... and how technology will challenge us to remember what it means to be human.

Goodreads Ratings: 3.93 stars with over 1,000 ratings

Genre Listing: Science Fiction, Young Adult, Dystopian, Fantasy, Apocalyptic

Goodreads Challenge: 38/50   

2021 Reading Challenge:  #23 Read a book with Human, People, or Person in the title (Find the entire challenge here)

Book Review:

Hi Readers! I hope everyone is doing well. I can't believe it's already October. I feel like this year has flown by. That means the 2022 challenge will be launching in just a few months! The lovely  Co-conspirator, Tress, and I already have a list started with goodies for next year. 

I initially put The Legacy Human on the Science Fiction prompt, but I realized that we had #23 for Human. It also dawned on me that I probably intended to read this book for that one initially. I expected this to be a lot shorter of a read than it actually was. I'm not sure if it was just a glitch in the matrix, but the book made it seem like page 408 was the last page; however, that was at around 80%.  There ended up being quite a bit of story left. There is not really a point to me mentioning this.

I'm still trying to piece my thoughts on The Legacy Human together. The more I over-analyze it, the less I'm going to like the book. For most of the story, I thought the concept was interesting. Humans figured out how to combine AI technology with Genetics and live forever. The Ascenders, as they're called, run the world and basically control how the Legacy Humans (non-AI population) live. I was entertained while reading it, but there were a lot of issues I had with it. I'm making no promises about keeping spoilers out of this review. Sorry.

For the vast majority of reading this book, I felt like I was reading a weird Hunger Games or Divergent knock-off. In Legacy Human, the ordinary people are all mainly creative people like artists or writers. Every year there's the Creative Olympics, which have replaced the regular Olympics. Teenagers can compete in their chosen art, and the winners of each group get to ascend. This is the only way to Ascend. There's this whole political aspect behind the games where Sponsors are getting to use their Legacy as a bragging right and maybe some nefarious activities to tip the scales. There's also a group of the resistance trying to fight the AI overlords and some big reveal about Elijah's lineage. The big secret made zero sense to me. I understood what was being said, even expected it. However, I just felt like the Science made little to no sense. 

I never really felt like any of the book's Science was actually explained. I felt like I was just supposed to know and understand it without an explanation. For example, Elijah kept referencing being in a "Fugue State." This is supposed to be a YA Science Fiction, so I would expect the Science wouldn't be highly complicated. I'd expect it to at least be summarized enough to where the average teenager or young college student can understand. Most days, I consider myself to be reasonably intelligent and have a vast understanding of things. I had no idea what a fugue state was. The whole time I thought it was some word the author made up that was slang for the story. I googled it after I finished reading the book. Per Britannica, "Dissociative fugue (psychogenic fugue, or fugue state) presents as sudden, unexpected travel away from one's home with an inability to recall some or all of one's past. Onset is sudden, usually following severe psychosocial stressors." Now that I know what it is, it makes sense, but I don't feel like the context was there for the average reader. This is just one example where I think the vocabulary needed to be better tailored to the audience. 

I felt like the most developed character was Cyrus. Everyone else fell a little flat and started to blend together. I didn't really feel like anyone had their own individual voice. I had to scroll back up to the summary to even remember Elijah's name. Everyone else has kind of escaped me. I think this is a case of an interesting concept and not great execution. I didn't hate the book (despite how this review probably seems), but I didn't really love it either. At best, I can describe it as ok but fell flat in a lot of aspects. I sort of enjoyed it while I was reading it, but I think I've talked myself down from 3 stars to 2 stars after writing this review. 

Book Review of Branded by Abi Ketner and Missy Kalicicki

Goodreads Summary: Fifty years ago The Commander came into power and murdered all who opposed him. In his warped mind, the seven deadly sins were the downfall of society.
To punish the guilty, he created the Hole, a place where sinners are branded according to their sins. Sinners are forced to live a less than human existence in deplorable conditions, under the watchful eye of guards who are ready to kill anyone who steps out of line.

Now, LUST wraps around my neck like thick, blue fingers, threatening to choke the life out of me. I’ve been accused of a crime I didn’t commit, and the Hole is my new home.

Constant darkness.

Brutal and savage violence.

Excruciating pain.

Every day is a fight for survival.

But I won’t let them win. I will not die in the Hole.

I am more than my brand. I’m a fighter. My name is Lexi Hamilton, and this is my story.
Goodreads Rating: 3.91 with over 2,900 ratings.
Genre listing: Science Fiction, Dystopia, Young Adult, Romance, New Adult, Fantasy, Apocalyptic, Post-Apocalyptic, Action, Sociology, Abuse
Get the Book: Amazon, Book Depository

Review: 

Edited 12/1/2016

I finally took the plunge and invested in Amazon's Kindle Unlimited. I've been tossing around the idea for awhile, and finally decided to go with the free trial. I think that the price is going to be worth it. What's been happening with that unread folder is that I'll read two chapters and just delete whatever book it is because I can't get into it. There's a ton of books I want to read that have come out recently, so I'm hoping that they'll be listed on unlimited.

I found Branded on Unlimited. It was my third choice, but I kept having issues with books and stuff. Honestly, I should have kept looking. The premise behind this book sounds awesome. The government's fallen and in an attempt to create a perfect society the crimes are the seven sins and offenders are sent to what is called the hole. The hole is a prison where the sinners work and live. It's disgusting and surrounded by death and war. This prison is where my interest fades.

I love the idea behind this book, but I was left unsatisfied. We follow the story through Lexi Hamilton's eyes. She's falsely accused of lust by her mother and is sent to the hole. However, she's the one sinner who is protected. Her gallant protector is Cole. I hate to ruin the surprise for everyone, but Lexi and Cole fall madly in Luv. I typed it that way on purpose, and yes it hurt to do so. It's no wonder she got branded with Lust.

I found Lexi and Cole to be empty. I felt completely disconnected from them, and I got the impression of them just being placeholders. I found Lexi to be a weak character and female in general. She constantly needs to be saved by Cole, Bruno, Sutton, Zeus, or Keegan. By the time she learns to fight, I was so ready to be done with the book that I didn't care. I thought Lexi was going to be this bad-asses take no crap kind of female lead, and the more the story goes on, the more child-like and weak she becomes. The strongest character in this book is Alyssa, who is barely in the story.

I wanted to see more of the struggles in the hole. The action seemed rushed so that the authors could talk more about how dreamy Cole is. *Gag*. Because of her pedestal position of being protected, I just don't think Lexi gave us that great of an understanding of the hole. Also, I don't trust Cole at all. I just don't get his transition from being an asshole to hanging onto Lexi's every whim.

I ended up putting this book down for a few days. I was disconnected beforehand, but when I picked it back up, I just wanted the book to be over with. It had a lot of promise but falls short in so many ways. There's no character depth, no real reason for us to care about the hole, and is more focused on the relationship between Lexi and Cole that readers don't get a true sense of the Revolt. The Revolt is just thrown in all of the sudden to the point where it seems forced and forgotten. I read it and was like "Oh we're revolting? meh." That's not a good sign. As a reader, I need to care about why characters are revolting, and I didn't believe in this book. It was very obvious to be an afterthought in the story. The two best characters in this book aren't even the main characters. One is barely in the story (Alyssa), and the other is a dog (Zeus).

Two out of Five moons.

Book Review of Fiend by Peter Stenson

Goodreads Summary:
 When Chase Daniels first sees the little girl in umbrella socks tearing open the Rottweiler, he's not too concerned. As a longtime meth addict, he’s no stranger to horrifying, drug-fueled hallucinations.
   But as he and his fellow junkies soon discover, the little girl is no illusion. The end of the world has arrived.
   The funny thing is, Chase’s life was over long before the apocalypse got here, his existence already reduced to a stinking basement apartment and a filthy mattress and an endless grind of buying and selling and using. He’s lied and cheated and stolen and broken his parents’ hearts a thousand times. And he threw away his only shot at sobriety a long time ago when he chose the embrace of the drug over the woman he still loves.
   And if your life’s already shattered beyond any normal hopes of redemption…well, maybe the end of the world is an opportunity. Maybe it’s a last chance for Chase to hit restart and become the man he once dreamed of being. Soon he’s fighting to reconnect with his lost love and dreaming of becoming her hero among civilization’s ruins.
   But is salvation just another pipe dream?
   Propelled by a blistering first-person voice and featuring a powerfully compelling antihero, Fiend is at once a riveting portrait of addiction, a pitch-black love story, and a meditation on hope, redemption, and delusion—not to mention one hell of a zombie novel.
Goodreads Rating: 3.53 with 1,016 ratings
Genre listing: Horror, Zombies, Apocalyptic, Science Fiction, Dystopian
Get the Book: Amazon, Book Depository

Review:

Edited 12/1/2016

  Disclaimer: I received a copy of Fiend by Peter Stenson through Blogging for Books in exchange for an honest book review. 

I've been eying this book for a while now. I kept seeing it on Blogging for books, and it was calling for me to request it, but I didn't. I finally did a few weeks ago and got it in the mail and instantly had to read it. This might not make sense to anyone but me, but the paperback cover feels like a book about Zombies and Meth should feel- grimy. It's just got this weird texture to it, and that fits with the story (at least in my mind). There's a comment on Goodreads that someone posted that I feel sums up the book perfectly. "An easy description of this book would be Breaking Bad meets Walking Dead. It's almost like AMC went out and commissioned someone to take advantage of two of their hit shows and mash them up."  I haven't seen Breaking Bad, but I assume this book is the love child of the two shows. 

If you can't tolerate vulgar language, this is not the book for you. I, however, thrive in vulgar language so this was right up my alley. This book is a view of what would happen if drug addicts were the only ones left in a Zombie Apocalypse. I don't know about other people, but for Chris and I, talking about how to survive a Zombie Apocalypse is a pretty reoccurring conversation topic. I thought that overall this was a fascinating take on a traditional entertainment trend. I feel like everything I've read in the Zombie genre has been either military-Esq types, hunter-types, or scientist-types surviving. It was kind of interesting to see a take with a group of people who I usually wouldn't think of as survivors. 

Sorry for the big spoiler here, but I like how this one doesn't necessarily end with a happy ending. This doesn't necessarily end with everyone dying, but it doesn't exactly give me the impression of ultimate survival either. It sort of leaves things hanging. Which I think is a more realistic approach to what would happen if Zombies were real. I feel like the book ends a lot like how it begins and comes full circle. I like that it's a stand-alone novel. I'm getting burnt out on series. 

Beyond the Zombies and gore, there's the drug story, and what it does to people. I have no idea if what was portrayed in the story as far as drug use goes is what it's like, but it felt believable to me. There's also a broken romance in the book, which I liked seeing a not-so-perfect love in a book. The relationship is just as unbalanced as KK and Chase's drug use. 

I enjoyed this book, and I'm already forcing Leslie to read it this weekend. We're meeting tomorrow for lunch since it's my birthday. I'm making her borrow it and read it because it's awesome. It's a quick read (about 300 pages), filled with zombies, drugs, and lots of swearing. Aside from the drugs, it's my type of book. Yay Zombies!

Five out of Five moons!

Book Review of Paradigm by Ceri A. Lowe Review

Goodreads Summary: What if the end of the world was just the beginning?
Alice Davenport awakens from a fever to find her mother gone and the city she lives in ravaged by storms – with few survivors.
When Alice is finally rescued, she is taken to a huge underground bunker owned by the mysterious Paradigm Industries. As the storms worsen, the hatches close.
87 years later, amidst the ruins of London, the survivors of the Storms have reinvented society. The Model maintains a perfect balance – with inhabitants routinely frozen until they are needed by the Industry.
Fifteen-year-old Carter Warren knows his time has come. Awoken from the catacombs as a contender for the role of Controller General, it is his destiny to succeed – where his parents failed.
But Carter soon discovers that the world has changed, in ways that make him begin to question everything that he believes in. As Carter is forced to fight for those he loves and even for his life, it seems that the key to the future lies in the secrets of the past...
Goodreads Rating: 4.05 with 37 ratings.
Genres: Science Fiction, Dystopian, Young Adult, Apocalyptic, Post-Apocalyptic
Get the Book: Amazon,  Book Depository

Review:

Edited 11/24/2016

Before I get started here's a disclaimer. I received this book in exchange for a review from Netgalley.

Paradigm by Ceri A. Lowe is a different take on the dystopian stories than what I've previously read. It starts out with Carter Warren being told he has five minutes left. Carter gets frozen at around 15 or 16 years old so that he can come back in the future and make a contribution to society. The society is the new community that formed after a five-year storm pelted the modern world. They've taken out all of the fun things that make us human and stripped the world down to necessities. There's no money, people work to keep the community going, everyone dresses the same, food is synthetic, pretty basic dystopian stuff.
When Carter wakes up, it's 15ish years later, and he's a contender to be Controller of this community. As soon as he's back, he finds out that he has twins, a boy and a girl that stemmed from one drug-induced night at a party. The twins are the first in the community, so it's a huge event. In alternating chapters, we get introduced to Alice, who is a survivor of the storms and an original scout for the community. At first, the switching back and forth bugged me, but after a while, you start to see how the two are connected. Alice is there for the creation of the society, and Carter may very well be there for its demise.
I thought the story was interesting enough, but I thought some of the plot twists were fairly predictable especially towards the end. During the end we find out about Carter's great-grandfather (or, at least, I think that was his relation to him) and how he survived after the storms in Alice's house, and how it points to there being another civilization (hello, book #2). I also found the whole Deadlands encounter with Lily to be incredibly obvious.
Some of the wording seemed very off to me, especially in the scenes with Alice. The dialect in her portion of the story struck me as forced. Honestly, if I saw the phrase "Now you see it, and now you don't" one more time I was going to stop reading. Alice also seemed robotic to me. She just didn't resonate with me and seemed emotionless. Carter did to some extent, but I was a little more forgiving of that since he was the one who was brought up by the community.
Some of the formattings were off (unnecessary spacing, and inconsistency in spacing paragraphs). There were some misspelled words, and at times, it seemed like words that should be there weren't. It also looked like at times that necessary paragraphs were taken out altogether. I often found myself reading, and then having to reread because it felt like I missed something, especially the closer to the end it got. I think at one point in time there was a character mentioned randomly that I don't remember being in the rest of the book.
Despite the issues I had with the book, I found it to be interesting. The interest level did start to fade for me towards the middle-to-end of the book but picked up again in the last two chapters. When the next one comes out, I'll probably give it a chance.
Feel free to leave me any comments on the book or the review.

Three out of Five Moons