Author: cute_writer_girl

Genre: Adventure

What I liked about this book:

The idea had potential. The people-with-timers-on-them thing has been done a million times to the point where there was a major (bad) motion picture, but there is always a new twist. The first chapter was really engrossing.

What I did NOT like about this book:

I feel like I'm reading a summary and not a book. The reason WHY people have timers in their arms is never talked about, and despite Cameron finding out Ruby's also reads zero, there is no discussion of it. You NEED a good, compelling reason for something like that for a plot like this to work. This doesn't have one. It leaves me on the hook for an explanation for too long, and I lost interest in it.

Everything from the carnival to Cameron arriving on Ruby's doorstep is glossed over, and none of it has any personality. Ruby reads like an NPC in a video game, and not a cool one. One of the ones that runs the weapons shops and just repeats the same line of dialogue over and over. She's an image of what someone thinks a nice grandma looks like, without any actual nice grandma traits.

Same with Cameron, though she's a little easier to relate to since the prose is in her point of view. She runs away for literally no discernible reason, immediately trusts a stranger, and just overall comes off as either pointless or kind of an idiot. Even the bit about her mom felt really shallow, because it would be NORMAL for her to be mad over that as opposed to a drawing her friend ripped up when she was a kid!

The prose was also missing a lot of commas. which really grated on me, and the total lack of description of anything in the environment gave it terrible white room syndrome.

Overall:

Another point for 'good idea, terrible execution'.

Rating:

3/10. I finished it. It wasn't torture.