(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)

Sixteen years after a deadly virus wiped out most of Earth’s population, the world is a perilous place.  Eighteen-year-old Eve has never been beyond the heavily guarded perimeter of her school, but the night before graduation, Eve learns the shocking truth about her school’s real purpose—and the horrifying fate that awaits her.

Fleeing the only home she’s ever known, Eve sets off on a long, treacherous journey, searching for a place she can survive.  Along the way she encounters Caleb, a rough, rebellious boy living in the wild.  Separated from men her whole life, Eve has been taught to fear them, but Caleb slowly wins her trust…and her heart.  He promises to protect her, but when soldiers begin hunting them, Eve must choose between true love and her life.

I started reading Eve after I finished Kushiel’s Dart, which was around two in the morning.  I intended just to read up to chapter 10, which would give me a good head start on tomorrow’s reading.

Yeah, right.

Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t stop reading Eve, something that’s extremely unusual in dystopic YA for me.  That is how I came to read until four in the morning on Sunday.  Staying up late to read on the weekend is not exactly unusual for me, but staying up late to read dystopic YA?  That’s new.  I have nothing against dystopian YA, but it like if you’ve read one book, you’ve read them all in terms of plot.

True, I could predict most plot twists in Eve.  Really, it follows the basic plot arc of all dystopia, not just YA.  Yet, somehow, Anna Carey managed to keep me in suspense, flipping pages furiously to find out what happened next.  It may seem like a contradiction, but I did predict the basic plot of the story and find it suspenseful at the same time.  Why?  Because the characters intrigued me.

From the book’s blurb you get the impression that Eve and Caleb are your typical YA couple, but they’re not.  Eve has led a very, very sheltered life and she has been conditioned not to trust men.  They don’t fall in Insta-Love but you get the feeling that this is a typical first love with all those messy, intense emotions and all of the ups and downs of a rollercoaster.

The world-building is good, but it never crosses into the realm of “Wow!  That was amazing!”  The way the King of New America rose to power seems plausible, as do the labour camps for orphaned boys, but I would have liked more detail about the plague.  What it was, how it started, etc.  But that’s probably just me who likes the gory details, so I can’t really complain about that.  I suspect it will be covered in more depth in the next two installments of the Eve Trilogy.

I give this book 3.5/5 stars.

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