Fire and Flood

I must confess that I read this simply because of the horrible reviews. Some of them are laugh out loud bad. In fact, the whole “it's the Hunger Games meets Pokemon” is exactly what made me go whoa, I need to read that. This is not the worst YA novel I've ever read, and it sure is not the best. It's middling.

In truth, Madox was the whole reason I hung in there. The Pandoras are awesome. I want one, just not the bear. Tella is a self absorbed a-hole, I'm not kidding. For me, she's the big negative here. I can't root for her. I don't like Guy either. And now that the two characters I did like are gone, I'm not sure I'll read the second one. If there is going to be more scenes like the one in which Guy and Tella are drawn to touch each other near the fire, despite the fact that everyone in their group is trying to eat and is watching them.....I think I laughed so hard at the cheese in that I had to put the book down for awhile and read something else.

So, what is pretty good are the survival bits. I like that there are different settings in different climates (jungle and desert are in book one). If there could be more of that and less of Tella and Guy, things would be good. There is potential here for a good story. The Dink thing proved that. I think the publisher could have polished this more before they cut it loose.