Review of 'Emerge: The Judgment'

 
This second book of the Emerge series resumes a few months after the first book's story concludes, and follows up well. It answers several questions, is a full novel in itself, and still leaves us waiting for more.
I thought the writing was better in this book, with fewer issues as far as giving me context and with the secondary characters coming to life. Also, the love triangle is less of an issue in this book, although it still irritated me. Allie's relationships with boys in general irritates me. 'I don't want to commit and I want to make sure I'm my own person without being connected to a man' is wonderful, especially for a teenager for goodness' sake (I'm rolling my eyes right now about another (very famous) series that I compare this one too, where the heroine just really wanted me smack her around and put her in therapy), but I don't think it should be followed with 'but maybe we could just have sex because I think I'm ready for that'. Anyway, more on that at the bottom of the review.
Overall this story was cool, exciting, with neat characters and interesting super powers. The characters have flaws and struggle to overcome, mostly without being depressive or whiney.
 
Language: Very mild.
 
Violence: There's fighting and craziness, but I don't remember anything super explicit.
 
Sexual Content: Religious upbringing aside, if people want to think they're mature and ready for major decisions like sex, shouldn't they think about possible consequences? On the male character side of things in this book it's even worse. 'I'll just sleep around because the girl I really want doesn't want me right now, and I'm not going to deny my hormones just because I'm in love with someone else.' And then for the girls to be OK with that…I know I have biases on this topic, and I'm pretty comfortable with them, but it's a fact that there are a lot of emotions at play when it comes to intimacy of different degrees, and a lot of risks as well. Maybe because these characters are immortals they don’t have to be concerned about some things, but since this is a young adult story I think those things should have been addressed. Sex without intimacy or commitment is a real trend, made popular by the many who want to take what they can get and feel they owe nothing, but I JUST CAN'T STAND IT. On the bright side, this part of the story wasn't nearly as forefront as it might have been, and I was able to roll my eyes and move on to enjoy the others.
 
Diversity: OK, this point is weird. There is definitely a variety of characters, but often I can't remember what they look like or anything because it simply isn't mentioned very often, and there are too many characters for me to remember them all. Some of them I remember are Asian because of their names, but that's about it.
 
Overall Message/Plot: I like the focus on independence and how Allie wants to make sure she's not being half a person by relying on guys. I just wish she stuck with it longer because the fact is that she has a long way to go before she's really mature, but I've said enough about that. Although it does have interesting characters it's more plot driven with lots of action and a little mystery about what is going to happen, and it does that pretty well. I enjoyed it enough that I intend to get the next book when it comes out.
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