Karri Thompson

READ IN ENGLISH

Read all my reviews on http://urlphantomhive.booklikes.com

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

Mirror X is the first book in the Van Winkle Project series.

Finally! It's been a while since I actually liked a Dystopian YA, but this was a very interesting story. A weird side note though, the description in the blurb (at least on GR) is incorrect, as she doesn't come from 'space'...

When Cassie wakes in a hospital, she never expected to be in the 31st century. She died a thousand years ago in a helicopter crash and her body was frozen, in hopes she could once be restored back to life. But if that's what is best for Cassie?

The 31st century isn't unlike the 21st, but with some robots, no trees/grass and a mandatory iPad. Medicine has obviously invented new stuff, as they can now bring people back from the dead (by regrowing all neurons in the brain; how can she still has her memory?). Everyone is wearing a L-band, which can track people down and also is a telephone and a key. No one seems to have problems in this Brave New World...

That's not where the comparison ends. Babies are grown in artificial wombs, as a great plague that killed half the population left all women infertile. Their solution was cloning, but a flaw caused all women to have under developed ovaries and therefore no eggs. Cloning a clone isn't a success either, so the world's population is running on it's last legs. Until that is, Cassie is awakened, with her perfectly fine ovaries...

I had to search Van Winkle, as I had never heard of it. It turns out to be a short story by Washington Irving about a man who falls asleep and wakes twenty years later to find the world a completely different place (as in the US are no longer part of Great Britain). Nice touch.

What did annoy me was the love *insert some kind of geometrical shape*. I could for once understand why everyone would fall in 'love' with her, as she is the only person on the planet who can bear children. But there are too many mentions that she's so beautiful, making it just plain old insta-love.

However, it was very hard for me to put this novel down. The story has something refreshing even though it's far from perfect. I'll check out the next book in this series...… (lisätietoja)

2.5 stars

Read all my reviews on http://urlphantomhive.booklikes.com

Last year I read, liked and reviewed Mirror X, the first book in the Van Winkle Project series. Van Winkle refers to a short story by Washington Irving about a man who wakes after twenty years and finds the world has completely changed.

In the last book, Cassie was awakened ten centuries after she died and found herself (and the daughter's she gave birth to while in some kind of a coma) the only fertile female in the world. Obviously everyone is after her in this Brave New World where everyone's every move is followed and documented.

I was expecting a lot of this book, since I quite liked the first book, but I was a bit disappointed. Not in the least because at the beginning I had a lot of trouble remembering who everyone was and what their role in the series was. The secret society really doesn't seem that secret and their plan is not that original (I have a feeling I know where this is going). I'm very much surprised that Cassie is still surprised when she finds out she has been deceived, again.

Some small things bothered me while reading, in general the 31st century is looking way too much like the 21st. But then Cassie makes a lot of references to things that are apparently completely unknown, like for example Latin (I will not believe that the knowledge of the fact there once was a language called Latin is completely lost to a 'genius geneticist'). Also James Bond and quite some other references are unknown, although this doesn't stop Cassie from using them all the time.

Also, 'son of a clone' *sigh*

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!… (lisätietoja)