Acid in The Reader's Lounge

Feb 27, 2013 Danielle rated it really liked it

Rating: 3.5 Stars

I’ve been excited about this book for quite a while now. I usually buy my books on kindle but being in Ireland we have to buy from the American store so imagine my panic when I logged on to discover it wasn’t available. I rang my local book store on release day and stayed on hold and made them search through the delivery boxes they received the day before and find me a copy. Good thing I did, they had only received TWO! Needless to say they learned not to come between me and my Rating: 3.5 Stars

I’ve been excited about this book for quite a while now. I usually buy my books on kindle but being in Ireland we have to buy from the American store so imagine my panic when I logged on to discover it wasn’t available. I rang my local book store on release day and stayed on hold and made them search through the delivery boxes they received the day before and find me a copy. Good thing I did, they had only received TWO! Needless to say they learned not to come between me and my books
Acid was a breath of fresh air. I had been bemoaning the quality of dystopian YA fiction released recently and if it wasn’t for Dan Well’s Partials series I would have given up on buying it so I was hoping Acid would deliver and for the most part it did.
Jenna Strong is kick-ass. A 17 year old girl accused of murdering her parents, she is sent to the toughest and scariest all-male prison in Britain after being tried and convicted as an adult. She learns pretty quickly to defend herself against the many pervs wanting to take advantage and has moulded herself into one deadly weapon. When her only friend in the prison risks his life to break her out, she must uncover the secrets from her past in order to survive.
I loved the setting of Acid, it was refreshing to read about a murky, harsh, future in Britain rather than America. For me it made things seem more “real” as I could recognise place names and had walked down the same streets that Jenna walked. The A(gency) C(rime) I(nvestigation) D(efence) police state really reminded me of a late 90′s show called “Dark Angel” starring Jessica Alba. The brutal tactics, laws and sectors of the IRB (Independent Republic of Britain) were frightening and Pass did a good job of unveiling a totalitarian corrupt world where people who step out of line are brutally put back in place. Everything is regulated down to choice of “Life-Partner”, when a child can be born and what job they can have. Overall I thought the world building was quite strong, I would have liked a little more but in comparison to recent rival books it was great. Pass uses newspaper articles and bulletins to give the reader an overview of how the world is run and I thought this was a really interesting and unique way to get the point across.
Jenna was a great MC that I couldn’t help but root for. She was brave, loyal and sympathetic. At times I grew frustrated by how willing she was to go with the flow and accept her surroundings but I assume that was due to her background which is explained in the book. I loved the character of Max, with whom Jenna builds a friendship with whilst on the run and the other secondary characters whilst we didn’t get to know them as well I thought were well rounded and interesting.
Plot wise: I thought the story was really unique and original however about two-thirds of the way through it proved problematic as the reader is immediately aware of a plot twist for the character where her memory is affected which holds no suspense as we always know she will get her memory back. The use of re-constructive surgery was also a bit irksome for me as the tech seemed a little too unbelievably advanced despite the futuristic setting and it seemed a little too “convenient” to move the plot along. I thought the writing was superb I just felt that at times the plot was too rushed and I would have enjoyed more explanation into how the society came about and more mention of the outside world.
Overall, I thought Acid was edgy, fun and un-put-down-able at times and I’m excited to read more from this début author.

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Jul 02, 2013 Pili rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Writing a review for ACID is gonna be a bit tough, not because I don't think it is a brilliant book, that it is, but because I think this is one of those reviews that must be absolutely spoiler free, and that's gonna be hard to pull off!

ACID is a purely dystopian tale, with a touch of science fiction due to the future time setting, but it doesn't have the usual post-apocalyptic undertones of other dystopians. Here there was no worldwide catastrophe, here humanity doesn't have to start from scrat ...more

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Mar 14, 2014 Stacie (Shy Book Nerd) rated it liked it · review of another edition

Actual rating 3.5

This was quite the action packed book. I enjoyed it for the most part, I just couldn't really connect with the main character, Jenna. I liked her don't get me wrong, but for some reason I couldn't relate to her. Maybe because there was so much action and mind playing that there wasn't enough time to just calm down and chill. Jenna was constantly on the run from the bad guys known as Acid. They sort of reminded me of the bad society from the Matched series by Ally Condie, where t ...more

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Jan 05, 2013 Emma marked it as to-read

Shelves: arc, ya, for-review, from-publisher, physical-arc, part-of-series

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