Book Review: Mystic City

Author: Theo  Lawrence

Edition: Corgi Paperback

Released: October 9th 2012

Series: Mystic City #1

Pages: 397

 

Aria Rose, youngest scion of one of Mystic City's two ruling rival families, finds herself betrothed to Thomas Foster, the son of her parents' sworn enemies. The union of the two will end the generations-long political feud—and unite all those living in the Aeries, the privileged upper reaches of the city, against the banished mystics who dwell below in the Depths. But Aria doesn't remember falling in love with Thomas; in fact, she wakes one day with huge gaps in her memory. And she can't conceive why her parents would have agreed to unite with the Fosters in the first place. Only when Aria meets Hunter, a gorgeous rebel mystic from the Depths, does she start to have glimmers of recollection—and to understand that he holds the key to unlocking her past. The choices she makes can save or doom the city—including herself.

I actually got this book out for review over a month ago now (before it's release date, can you believe it?!) and since I've been wanting to write up at least one book review before I practically disappear from the blogosphere for a week or two due to a truck-load of studying, I felt it should most definietly be for this book. So, here we go. When I first came across Mystic City by Theo Lawrence, if I'm totally honest, it didn't really jump out at me. Sure, it appealed to me in some respects but it just didn't jump out at me like, for example, Divergent did. But I'm extremely happy I agreed to review this book as it turned out to be a pretty great read. :)

No need to bore you with the whole 'I ♥ Dystopian' speech again so I'll just get straight to it. One of the aspects I loved about this book was the fact that the author played the world building more toward the whole global warming situation. I've not read any other dystopian books that've done this so it was really interesting and straight away gave the book something unique and intriguing. Overall I was rather impressed with the futuristic city Lawrence created - yet again another haunting vision of the future! ;) - and can't wait to see what he comes up with in the next book! He also portrayed the main character, Aria through the use of first person which I was glad about. If I haven't already said before; I prefer first person to third in most cases. ;D

Speaking of Aria, she was a really likeable heroine who was strong, clever, brave and overall a nice character to lead the story. Straight away she enticed me into her story and bound me to it. Another character I loved was Hunter. He fascinated me right from the get go. Not only was he strong and valiant, he also has a really loveable and sweet side to him as well. He was sort-of hard not to get along with really. ;) However, whereas I got along with both Aria and Hunter, Aria's family and friends were a different matter. Bennie and Kiki - the friends - came across as really naive and stuck up which I didn't like one bit. And Aria's parents were just too infuriating. But I'm glad to say that Aria's character development throughout the story helped me over look that. :)

To conclude, Mystic City by Theo Lawrence is a great debut which he should be proud of as it certainly scored a well-deserved rating from me (and I'm sure many others)! It brought something fresh to the dystopian genre and a main character who's development just helped add that little bit more to the story. It also holds a few twists and turns which I admired - that kept getting better and better toward the end! - and a romance that, though a little soppy for my taste at times, was really sweet. I definietly recommend this book to anyone who loves dystopian with a side order of cute romance! ;D

FOUR STARS! x)

A big thank you to Random House for sending me out a copy of this book to review!

 

Happy Reading,

Rachel xoxo

 

PS: See you in a couple of weeks! :)

PPS: Y'know, it would just be such a nice Christmas present if when I came back I had 400 followers... Just sayin'. ;) But seriously. If you do follow, thanks a billion! And if you have a blog, don't hesitate to put your url in a comment below so as I can hop through when I come back! (: