Megan Miranda
Synopsis from goodreads.com:
Eleven minutes passed before Delaney Maxwell was pulled from the icy waters of a Maine lake by her best friend Decker Phillips. By then her heart had stopped beating. Her brain had stopped working. She was dead. And yet she somehow defied medical precedent to come back seemingly fine. Everyone wants Delaney to be all right, but she knows she's far from normal. Pulled by strange sensations she can't control or explain, Delaney finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her altered brain now predicting death, or causing it?
Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who recently emerged from a coma with similar abilities. At first she's reassured to find someone who understands the strangeness of her new existence, but Delaney soon discovers that Troy's motives aren't quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature-or something much more frightening?
For fans of best-sellers like Before I Fall and If I Stay, this is a fascinating and heart-rending story about love and friendship and the fine line between life and death.
My thoughts on the book:
I really wanted to love this book. The concept was intriguing, and when I saw it in the library, I snatched it up, ran home, and started reading it right away. Unfortunately, that little bit of excitement I had from finding it at the library finally was the only exciting part of this whole experience. The book just fell flat. The plot was flat, the characters were flat, the supposed mystery was flat, the "action" was flat, the "romance" was flat. Flat, flat, flat. *yawn*
My first problem with this novel is that every character was a self-centered, stupid jerk. Decker was the worst friend ever. I wouldn't have been friends with him. But Delaney was a pushover, so that was fine. And Delaney, who was supposed to be sooo smart, if a little fat (which apparently made her hot, according to her... though she complained about it all the time but refused to work out - basically doing as much damage as an anorexic character would because not being active at all is unhealthy, too), keeps doing stupid, bratty things. She storms off in the middle of a freezing cold forest after drowning and almost freezing to death, for instance. She's just stupid. Carson is a manwhore, but that's okay and everyone loves him. However, Delaney judges Tara constantly because she's a whore. Sexual double-standard much? I mean sure, she's probably just jealous, but still. Very catty. Troy was also stupid, and I still don't know what his issue actually was. Anyway, moving on.
The pacing was slow-as-molasses, and the supposed suspenseful parts weren't at all suspenseful. There really was no big mystery, and for such a unique idea, the plot was extremely predictable. The romances were all annoying, and of course, motivated by self-centered reasons. Needless to say, this was not a feelgood book. I spent most of the novel hating everyone and being bored. I asked myself on more than one occasion if it was over yet. Turns out it wasn't. Also, the ending didn't answer any questions really. I mean sure, one thing happened, but it didn't answer a question. It was just an action that had occurred several times before and led to various forms of disaster. So what would happen this time? Well, no one knows. A few things were tied up, but at the end I was left with two feelings: "This is very ambiguous" and "so what? This book did not speak to me at all."
All of that being said, Miranda's writing was fairly good and the idea itself was a unique and interesting one. I just feel that it wasn't executed as well as it could have been. I will try another one of Miranda's books because I feel that she does have talent. It just wasn't fully utilized in this book, I think. I'm sure some people will love this book, and it didn't have a lot of the annoying YA trends like insta-love or superhero vampires. It just didn't work for me. I'd say check this one out from the library before buying it.
Want to buy Fracture?
Thanks so much your review saved me. I was at the B&N going to buy this, hardback. And we all know how expensive hardbacks are! I thought the story line too was so interesting. But after reading this so super glad I passed up on the book because of price. I will try the author but not this book. Thank you
ReplyDeleteKrista
Just like Krista I was really thinking about buying this book in hardback, but now I think an ecopy might be better, I still would like to read it but perhaps not investing that much money in it.
ReplyDelete