Genre: YA Contemporary
Published: January 5, 2016 by Sourcebooks Fire
Length: 292 pages
Source: Sourcebooks Fire (ARC)
“10:00 a.m.
The principal of Opportunity, Alabama’s high school finishes her speech, welcoming the entire student body to a new semester and encouraging them to excel and achieve.
10:02 a.m.
The students get up to leave the auditorium for their next class.
10:03
The auditorium doors won’t open.
10:05
Someone starts shooting.
Told over the span of 54 harrowing minutes from four different perspectives, terror reigns as one student’s calculated revenge turns into the ultimate game of survival.”
This one is a pretty quick read but I’m a bit disappointed that the pacing is slower. I was expecting a crap ton of action scenes, but the story is more like how the 4 different people narrating the story was affected by the killer. For a YA thriller read, this one is pretty mediocre. It didn’t make my heart race, or make my palms sweat. The intense scenes does not happen till the ending which is a shame because I thought the book would be action packed from start to finish.
I usually don’t have trouble with books that switches point of views, but the 4 different POV’s was very confusing during the first four chapters. It was hard to remember who was who, and which characters were related to which other narrators. I think if you’re going to read this book, you should try to read it within a day or two so that you won’t forget which character is which.
Moving on to the things I liked…THE CHARACTERS! Although they were hard to remember at first, I began to relate to them. Autumn, Sylv, Claire and Tomas were awesome protagonists and they were so DIVERSE guys! We have Autumn who is very passionate about dance and wants to get out of Opportunity High School, Sylv who loves her family and girlfriend Autumn, Claire who is part of the track & field team, and Tomas, a smart and caring Hispanic high schooler who is Sylv’s brother.
There wasn’t much romance in this book besides Autumn & Sylv but that’s okay. The story really focused more on the characters thinking about their future while being held in the auditorium by the killer. Overall if you’re looking for a book with suspense, diverse characters, and action scenes, this is for you! It is a very quick read (I read it in 2 days) so if you’re not really in the mood for those long, hefty books, you should pick this one up.
