FTC notice: This book was sent to me by the publisher
In the beginning of this year I told myself I was going to break out of my literary fiction rut and try new genres. So far I have tried several different genres but have held back trying Young Adult. I cant give a good reason for my hesitation for this expect maybe I thought Young Adult did not have much to offer me. I was sadly mistaken. Young Adult has changed since I was a young adult. So when I found out I had won a prize from Arm Chair BEA I picked three young adult books as the prize and I loved it. This is the first I read of three.
Tankborn is the first Young Adult that I have tried outside the harry potter craze. It is about a girl who is a GEN (genetically engineered non-human) who is given her Assignment. Before she leaves her nurture mother though she is given a strange package to carry into where the humans live.
Her best Friend is a nurturer tasked with the care of human babies. When they realize babies are being taken in the middle of the night they realize something more sinister is happening.
I could see where a young adult especially one who is in some way different (Like I was with a hearing aid when I was younger) could relate to this story. It showed that just because you are different does not mean you are even less important. Even though they are tankborn they are still important in the grand scheme of things.Likewise YA with disabilities have their place in society also.
I also liked that it was the characters that were flawed that had a hand in solving the issues in the book. That showed that people who are different can still be leaders and have strong role models.
The characters are fully realized to such an extent that the readers starts to care about what happens to them. I was rooting for the characters to come out victorious when they were fighting to save themselves and other people.
The story itself was an engrossing one. I found that I couldn’t put the book down because I wanted to know what happened next. The pace was faster than I find in lit fiction. Which is a good thing because I seem to find a lot of books to be dragging these days. Not this one though.
I really liked this book and would recommend it to a YA that has something different about them to show them that they too can find their place and overcome.
