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Title: Enhanced
Author: Courtney Farrell
Publisher: Crescent Moon Press
Released On: August 15, 2013
BLURB:
Michelle was born into the Institute’s
eugenics program, where doctors breed people like livestock. One powerful man
decides which children grow up, and which disappear. Culls are dumped in the
slum outside Institute walls, and those kids never come back. Michelle has
survived every purge, and she’s about to win a luxurious life as a breeder.
When her brother and her boyfriend are both mysteriously culled, despite their
high scores, she goes over the wall to find them. Alone in the ghetto, she’s in
trouble until handsome, streetwise Dillon stakes a claim to her. She’s
mortified because the Enhanced see Norms as little more than animals. But the
doctor is using the missing boys in a twisted experiment, and she needs
Dillon’s help to stop him. Michelle must rescue the boys, but a plague is
spreading, the doctor is after her, and Dillon isn’t thrilled to help her find
her lost boyfriend.
MY THOUGHTS:
I got this book from the author free of cost in exchange of
an honest review from my side.
Firstly I would like to thank the author and the publisher
for giving me this opportunity of reading and reviewing this fabulous book.
I thoroughly enjoyed it and loved the unique concept as
well. The pacing is good and it kept me hooked in. Moreover I liked the
characters a lot, they are developed and fully flourished, and even the side
characters were very good. I loved Michelle and Dillon very much, Michelle is a
perfect kick-ass heroine.
There is power-packed action and the action scenes were
executed perfectly, moreover the suspense is eerie and the mystery interested
me throughout the story. Sci-Fi and Dystopian lovers will like this story very
much.
I loved the writing style of the author and the twists that
the author introduced within the book really stunned me. A great and must read
for ya all.
Rating: Four Stars
EXCERPTS:
The
little redheads shifted uncomfortably. Finally, one looked up at the teens.
"Don't tell," she pleaded. "We just come here sometimes to look
for-"
"They were both here
too," interrupted her sister, elbowing her. "And there's no
rule-"
"Shhh!" Sylvia cut
them off. "Look."
Far away, men appeared in the
alley. They moved slowly, keeping to cover when they could, like predators. Rosa
walked along the top of a pipe with her baby on her hip. She climbed down and
looked inside it, then nervously checked the dark mouths of other pipes.
"Euuw," Michelle
murmured, as Rosa crawled inside one of the dark holes. "There've got to
be spiders in there. Why would anyone….”
But
then they saw why. As Rosa backed out of the hole, careful not to bump her baby's
head on the rim, she dragged a large black duffel bag from its hiding place.
She slung the long strap over one narrow shoulder. It looked heavy. With the baby
on one hip and the bag on the other, the girl used the rim of the pipe to pull
herself up. She moved off slowly, away from the oncoming men.
"She doesn't see
them," said one triplet.
"She's baiting a trap, just
like last time," said another.
"No, she's alone. Plus she
brought the baby, and she didn't last time. She wouldn't use her baby as bait."
"A trap?" asked
Sylvia, sounding concerned. "For who?"
"For the tattooed
men," Sara answered. "The mean ones who…"
An
awkward silence fell. The little girl tried again. "They…they catch women,
even little girls sometimes, and…"
"Rape," Jennie said
bluntly. "That's the word for it. Rape."
"Oh my God," Michelle
said, meeting Sylvia's eyes. They both
automatically looked out the window. Rosa hadn't made it very far.
The little redheads looked
stricken. Two of them stared down their sister. "I know, I found it in a
book," Jennie said defensively. She glared like it was all her sisters’
fault. "They'll get those men, those girls will, just like last
time."
"Jennie, she's alone, take
a look for yourself," exclaimed Susan. "Don't be daft!"
"What?" Sylvia asked.
"They got the men how?"
"They sent one girl in
alone," Sara said. "But they hid all around her. She limped."
"Faking," a sister
interjected. Sara nodded.
"Then when the men
attacked, they shot them, from their hiding places."
"With arrows, and they
threw big rocks," Jennie finished.
"There was blood everywhere
and one girl…"
"Died."
There
was a long pause.
"And lots of the men were
hurt too, and three or four of them didn't get up when the others ran
away," Sara said. “They were dead."
"Dead." Jennie echoed.
"Definitely dead. Served them right.”
In
the alley below, the men were coming closer. The little mother worked hard,
boosting the bag over pipes and clambering after it with her baby. After a
while she took to setting the boy down and tossing the bag over each pipe, then
carrying him over. The men spread out and began to move faster.
"They're coming! Go! Go
now!" shrieked Jennie out the window. Rosa looked up in surprise and
spotted the girls at the window. The she whipped her head around and saw the
men. They were far away, but closing, moving a lot faster than she could over
the obstacles. Rosa dumped the bag in the mouth of the nearest pipe, grabbed
her baby, and took off as fast as she could.
"Shut up, Jennie!"
Sara screamed, punching her sister’s shoulder. She was hysterical and making a
lot of noise herself. "The guards will hear you, they'll come, and then
what? The gate, the gate, just like our-"
Susan grabbed Sara’s wrists.
"Shut up, please, please!"
Michelle and Sylvia just stared,
not sure what they were talking about. Outside, Rosa was about even with the
window and losing ground fast. The baby slowed her down and she wouldn’t leave
him. The men encircled her, cut off her escape. She looked up, searching for a
way up the wall, and found none. Rosa bent down, whispered in her baby's ear,
and dropped him at the entrance to a pipe. He was afraid and wouldn't go in
alone. She pushed him in, but he crawled back out. His cries echoed weirdly off
the tall metal wall.
The men came closer. Against thirteen
of them, Rosa had no chance. She yanked a metal pole out of the rubble and
brandished it, swinging it at whoever came closest. A short, powerfully built
man closed in and grabbed for the pipe. She faked high, and then slammed him in
the knee. Screaming, he went down. The others tightened their circle around
her, blocking her escape. The baby crawled underfoot, getting in the way while
his mother tried to defend him. Rosa caught one more with the pole, right in
the head, but then the others swarmed her, grabbing arms and legs and throwing
her down on her back. Michelle screamed, forgetting the guards, forgetting
everything except the horror in the shadows.
Sylvia ran across the room and
slammed her hand on a red button that Michelle hadn’t noticed before.
"What the hell,"
Michelle started to say, but then a computer panel slid open, lit with a yellow
glow.
"Ramirez, Sylvia Eve,"
Sylvia screamed into the screen. A red dot appeared. Sylvia leaned in, pressing
her eye to the retinal scanner.
"Condition?" The
computer voice sounded utterly calm.
"Emergency! Open
panel!" Sylvia cried.
"Authorized, Ramirez,
Sylvia, emergency intrusion alert," the computer responded coolly. A panel
slid back, exposing an array of sleek weapons on the wall. Sylvia grabbed a
long rifle and thrust it into Michelle's hands, then took another for herself.
Sylvia clicked over a little red
button on Michelle's rifle. "Safety's off now. It's loaded. Put the laser
dot where you want the bullet, pull the trigger. It'll recoil. Make short
bursts."
"Are you out of your
mind?" Michelle had never even seen a real gun before, let alone used one.
Sylvia got right in Michelle's
face. "Look. Outside. Now."
AUTHOR BIO:
Courtney Farrell was once a molecular
biologist, but her habit of daydreaming destroyed far too many experiments. As
it turned out, writing down the movies behind her eyes was a lot more fun than
lab work. Courtney is the author of fourteen nonfiction books for young people,
mostly on social and environmental topics. She lives with her family on a
Colorado ranch where they support a barn full of freeloading animals, including
a fat draft horse and a bunch of crazy chickens. Enhanced is her first novel.
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