This was an incredibly well crafted book based in the future with a really gorgeous premise.

In this futuristic world, many other solar systems have been colonized with various planets within them harbouring life, usually on just one continent. People use portals to get to these, and are charged for portal use. When the first other planet was colonized, many people left Earth in a hurry, and due to a data failure later, much of Earth's history was lost. As such, a lot of this book takes place on a dig site in New York City.

It was so fascinating seeing an optimistic future for Earth--so many of the dystopias I read involve some government or corporation taking over to save humanity from its own destruction--and to see them looking back at the world today. Seeing the way they discovered "ancient" artifacts was a lot of fun.

I did want to see more of the world, though. There's a strong military presence, but no talk of any government. There were some phrases that took me a while to understand (Twoing?!) and while I appreciate not having my hand held, sometimes I was just plain confused. The differences between various systems were intriguing though, and I'd have loved to see how today's Earth evolved into this world.

This had some very poignant moments. They refer to the twentieth century as "war, war, and bore" but Jarra talks about how those wars feel so distant yet two people killed in a more recent mission can feel so much more powerful and horrible. The tensions she envisioned between apes and exos and the way these were in reality were lovely social commentary.

At times, Jarra felt annoyingly perfect. She can do everything, and if she can't, she has a plan for how to figure out how to do it. I don't know how her class didn't get envious, but there were definitely times where I wanted her to fail out of petty frustration at her perfection. Even the history she made up turned out to be annoyingly perfect, and no one became suspicious about it. And Fian was boring.

There was a section near the end that didn't make sense to me. It used psychology kind of as an excuse to solve a few problems and advance the plot, but the psychology used wasn't believable, and really confused me. I thought Edwards really could have done better, and this was the one section that really pulled me out.

My library doesn't have the other two books. I am cry. But I really loved that this stands alone, and I'm not absolutely dying because I don't know what happens. Many kudos to the author for that; I've had too many cliffhangers lately!

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, too, and I was completely drawn into the world Edwards created.
( )

3.5 Stars ( )

This started well and had promise but then after THE EVENT it got all soap drama-ish and went meh ( )

Not really post-apocalypse, precisely, but on such a far future Earth that our recognizable world has crumbled and is being excavated by archaeologists, so it works in that sense.

I'm astonished at how much I liked this book -- that Jarra has so much anger and self-hate to work through seems off putting on the surface, but that she chooses to challenge herself and that she has so many honest thoughts about the consequences of her actions endears her to me. I'm also not usually drawn to books where that main character that I'm all bound up in has a psychotic break or personality split, and yet, somehow, it was not only believable but added perfectly to the tension of a book I was already struggling to put down. Is it far-fetched? Absolutely, but it's also kick-ass and a remarkable story about having courage and calling yourself on your own emotional reactions. Nicely done. ( )

This one got me right in the soul. Overtones of racism and disability discrimination, both internally and externally. The story of Jarra Reaath is one I will not forget, because when you strip away all the science fiction it is a story that happens every day for someone.

Whether you relate to Jarra or not this story has an important and beautiful message: acceptance starts within. If you don't love the skin/life you're in, it is an awful lot harder to go through it. This book tells the story of a girl who has grown up in a world that sees her as inferior for something out of her control. She grows up bitter and angry and with every intention of being just as horrible to these people as they have been to her. Will she take her revenge? You will have to read it to find out.

I especially loved that the ending isn't all sunshine and rainbows, it's just different from the start. ( )