DainyBernstein reviewed Starters by Lissa Price (Starters, #1)
Review of 'Starters' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
Full review on Reader's Dialogue: readersdialogue.blogspot.com/2012/09/starters.html
This book has got it all!! From gripping emotion, to thrilling action and suspense, complete with lush details and technical brilliance, it's a masterpiece!
First, I'm going to gush about the emotional connection. I completely connected with Callie right from the start, and stayed emotionally attached to her throughout the whole book. And her own emotions are so life-size, so real and overwhelming, that I felt them right along with her - the confusion, the betrayal, the moral dilemmas, the determination, the courage. Added to that, the cast of characters is utterly amazing. Every single one is a full character - down to Trax, the body bank technician, who appears only briefly for two scenes. The good guys, the bad guys - they're all completely fleshed out, no stock characters here! I whole-heartedly loved all Callie's friends and allies, and whole-heartedly hated …
Full review on Reader's Dialogue: readersdialogue.blogspot.com/2012/09/starters.html
This book has got it all!! From gripping emotion, to thrilling action and suspense, complete with lush details and technical brilliance, it's a masterpiece!
First, I'm going to gush about the emotional connection. I completely connected with Callie right from the start, and stayed emotionally attached to her throughout the whole book. And her own emotions are so life-size, so real and overwhelming, that I felt them right along with her - the confusion, the betrayal, the moral dilemmas, the determination, the courage. Added to that, the cast of characters is utterly amazing. Every single one is a full character - down to Trax, the body bank technician, who appears only briefly for two scenes. The good guys, the bad guys - they're all completely fleshed out, no stock characters here! I whole-heartedly loved all Callie's friends and allies, and whole-heartedly hated her enemies and adversaries - except for when I was confused, along with her, as to which they were. Then the ambiguity consumed me.
The other thing that kept me enthralled, aside from the emotional rollercoaster, was the edge-of-your-seat pacing of the action and suspense. Lissa unfolds the details and information slowly, teasingly, and then the action creeps up on you and you're in a full-on car chase scene! When the "plot thickens" and things start heating up at the end, I had to remind myself to keep breathing - and then when I read the last few paragraphs, I found myself staring blankly at the page and willing it to offer up more information so I wouldn't have to wait until December to find out what that all means.
And then on the other side of the brain, while I was just enjoying the ride of the novel, I was appreciating the technical mastery that Lissa pulls off. Unwisely, before I read the book, I read Lissa's FAQs, in which she addresses fan questions about details of the story. So I went into this thinking about how sometimes stories don't hold together and details don't seem to match up. Well, that is so not the case here. Everything makes sense, every little setup detail has payout further on in the story. The craft of the novel is subtle, so that unless you're paying attention to it, it just reads like a really good book. But if you're looking for it, you can see that Lissa really knows what she's doing.