Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Red compound makes them angry. Yellow exhausts them. Blue drives them into a state of ravenous addiction.
Kai thought she knew all about the chemically controlled soldiers. She thought she knew how dangerous they were and how they were to be avoided at all costs. While on a robbery attempt Kai finds that the life of being a thief with her twin brother Dax is getting to her and all she wants is some of the food that’s just sitting their unnoticed. One moment she’s reaching for the slice of cake and the next she’s captured by a handler and his soldier.
Kai wakes inside the military base and all she wants to know is what happened to her twin and what they want from her. It isn’t long before it all comes to light and Kai is not only living in the same quarters as the soldier that nearly killed her, Charlie, but with his girlfriend Tessa and always angry friend Finn. Oh and if things couldn’t get any worse she’s forced into a drug and training regimen where she is injected with the blue compound. The scientists have decided that having a former thief would be perfect for mining the mysterious power crystals beneath the desert.
After living in the same vicinity as the three soldiers it isn’t long before she starts to realise how wrong she had been about them, she's now starting to truly see them as they are; genetically enhanced, drug-controlled teenagers who have no say in their lives.
Meanwhile Dex and his genius boyfriend are trying to find a way to break the chemical code and get Kai out of the base but Kai has already found herself being drawn into her new world. On top of developing feelings for Finn, Kai’s judgement is becoming clouded and now she doesn’t know if she can escape without becoming a monster herself.
When I first started reading this book I wasn’t sure if it was going to be for me, I was getting extremely confused by the compound system and found myself having to re-read part but once I continued on (and made notes) the more it just clicked into place. I think what also helped was the idea of comparing them to the three sins wrath, glutton and sloth. I found the whole concept of the different classes really interesting, seeing how each class acted under the influence of the compound. I definitely would have liked more of the science behind the compounds and what it is exactly that triggers these behaviours.
While I did like our four main characters I felt that they weren’t any different from characters I had read in different books of this genre. At times I did feel sorry for them and what they were going through but I felt no real emotional connection to the four. I’m not sure if this was because it was the first book and we were only scraping the surface of these characters lives so I'm looking forward to seeing how the characters develop over the course of the series.
I found the way this book was written to be quite enjoyable in the sense that we were given different perspectives throughout. I felt like that it made the book more exciting and one of the reasons that I couldn’t put this book down. I personally would have liked to have read more from Dax's perspective to see what he was doing I stead of just appearing here and there.
Overall I did really enjoy this book and cannot wait to read the next part of this story.
Rating: 4/5 stars
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