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Review: Half Lives by Sara Grant


Present day: Icie is a typical high school teenager - until disaster strikes and her parents send her to find shelter inside a mountain near Las Vegas.

The future: Beckett lives on The Mountain - a sacred place devoted to the Great I AM. He must soon become the leader of his people. But Beckett is forced to break one of the sacred laws, and when the Great I AM does not strike him down, Beckett finds himself starting to question his beliefs.

As Beckett investigates The Mountain's history, Icie's story is revealed - along with the terrifying truth of what lies at the heart of The Mountain.

Sara Grant's HALF LIVES is a dystopian chronicle of the journeys of two unlikely heroes in their race against time to save future generations.


My Thoughts
This is an interesting title and really quite a thinker. I've literally just finished it but I think it might take a while for me to get my brain around it.

I must admit I got about two thirds the way through this book and I started to lose interest. I didn't find myself connecting with the characters especially those in the story set in the future and while I could see the odd link I didn't really see why the second narrative was needed. Quite honestly I got to the point where I was almost ready to skip the future narrative chapters in a bid to get the book finished quicker. Don't get me wrong the future stuff was interesting especially when you saw the way in which the society had evolved and how their names for groups and things were based on modern equivalents which were completely different to what they ought to be

However towards the end of the book things really started to click into place and I started to see how clever it was and how it all tied together and it has left me feeling like maybe I need to go back and reread the paragraphs set in the future to reread them now I am more informed to make all those little hints and clues make sense.

An interesting and different read which I'm glad finally made sense because for a good while I was worried it wouldn't. 

Comments

I was reading this the other day and I put it down probably just before 2/3 of the way through it. Not because I didn't get where it was going but because I did. Might go back to finish at some stage..