#102 The Darkest Minds

The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken 

Here i am reading yet another hyped YA book from 8 years ago, i was never really interested in reading this one when it came out and i know now after having read it that i would have loved it back then. It had that same vibe as many of the original 'YA classics' as i like to call them such as The Hunger Games, Divergent, Throne of Glass etc.

The Darkest Minds follows Ruby when she is 10 years old and epidemic breaks out that affects children aged 7-14. A lot of children didnt survive the virus outbreak but the ones who did were left with abilities. The government steps in and gathers these kids up and brings them to concentration like camps in order to keep the rest of the population safe. They are sorted into colours based on the abilities they have. All the reds and oranges are deemed more dangerous and are round up and shot. Ruby is an orange but lies during the testing and doesnt get found out and is put into the camp. The beginning of this book is a little confusing and takes a while to get going.

This book had a very interesting concept, not completely unique but interesting all the same. It reminded me a lot of Monument 14 (a trilogy i loved back in the day which came out just a few months before this book did) very representative of YA dystopia of that time (2011/2012). The reasoning for my rating of 3 stars is that i enjoyed the story, it was fast paced and interesting but its fall down was the characters, i couldnt connect with any of them really and if i cant connect with them enough to care about them then it just falls flat for me. Ruby was interesting, i enjoyed her internal conflict about her abilities and not wanting to get to people incase she hurt them and/or erased their memory. Liam was very two dimensional stereotypical teen boy in a YA book which centres around a female character, he was too nice and not very realistic, Chubbs was slightly better in the fact that he questioned things constantly, made mistakes and was very teenage like in his decision making. Zu was mildly interesting, i was hoping for more insight into what happened to her and why she didnt speak, this wasnt really explored as much as it could have been. That only leaves Clancy, which i knew from the first page he was introduced that he was bad news, he gave me 'The Governor' from The Walking Dead vibes in that he pretends to be nice and has created a safe haven for everyone when in reality he is an evil dictator who is controlling everyone. I presume that him being evil was meant to be a 'big reveal' which i saw straight through which was a bit disappointing.

The ending was interesting as it ended sort of like a stand alone but some what left open for there to be a sequel, not sure if this was purposeful at the time (i know its now a trilogy) i was very confused by the sequence of events, it sort of takes the whole 'if you love them let them go' a bit far like that scene in HP with Hermione and her parents except Hermione had good reason for doing what she did, Ruby not so much.I dont think ill bother with the second two books just purely based on the characters which is a shame but i do see why so many people enjoy this book. I also wouldnt be opposed to watching the film adaptation for this as i know theres a diverse cast and that sounds pretty cool and worth checking out.