Sekret

Book 1 for #TBRTakedown. This was so good! I loved the plots and the characters. Now I need to get my hands on Skandal.

From the start of this book I was pulled into the world of espionage, spies, and kids with psychic abilities. Lindsay Smith has crafted an amazing world in the 1960s with the events of the Cold War. While this is clearly fiction, there were so many elements that seemed so real to me. Smith clearly did her research on Russian and that time period for this series.

The plot of this series is incredibly deep and while I have no clue where things are headed, I'm perfectly okay with that. I loved not knowing where things were going and what to expect. I did figure out the one big reveal early but I was not overly disappointed in that. I think there were clues there to help you come to that prediction on your own.

As for the characters, I absolutely loved the group of misfit, psychic children. While I absolutely hated Misha and Masha, they were still their own unique characters that had a role to play. As for Sergei, on a purely personal note, I loved the hockey knowledge and obsession he had. As an avid hockey fan who knows how important that sport is in Russia, I loved the tribute to the sport through Sergei. I also loved Yulia and Valentin and the course of their friendship. It was definitely not thrown in your face like other books.

Overall, this was a fascinating read and a great start to what I assume is a fantastic series. I have high hopes that Skandal will live up to this book and I will enjoy it just as must and the story unravels further. There are a lot of loose ends to tie up and I cannot wait to see how that is accomplished.

This book is damn near perfect. In the Cold War, the second generation of a secret sect of the KGB who have been bred to have psychic powers are in training to be the next wave of spies. Enter Yulia, the daughter of geneticists, who is being held against her will in this school of the New World Order.
Here's what really, really works: Smith sets the scene so well that this world comes to life in vibrant color. The fact that there are some people with psychic abilities doing spy work in this world is as commonplace as bread lines. She mixes real historical events with this new storyline, calling in guest stars like Khrushchev and Gagarin and letting them walk around with her characters. The enemy here is, of course, the Americans and Smith really has us convinced that they might just be worse than the regime that is currently in charge of the Soviet Union. Brilliant.

I don't want to give anything away, but Yulia is one of THE strongest female characters I have read in a long time. Not once does a man jump in and save her. Her dedication is to her family (her mother and brother) FIRST, then to her own security. Her survival skills are high, and she is smart. Not just book smart, but smart.

What dragged for me: the love triangle. I get it. I really do, but it wore on me a little. Such a little thing, really, but I'm starting to think publishers will not publish a YA manuscript unless the author jams one in somewhere, and really with everything Yulia had going on- she really needed to deal with that too?

Back to the good: Smith realizes her readers are smart too. She doesn't spend a lot of time reexplaining things, or beating us over the head with messages. She drops hints (where DID Yulia's missing sweater go?), and allows us to pull it together on our own. I think anyone who picks up a book about the Cold War and psychic spies is unlikely to be the type to have a need for simplistic explanations or long descriptions of what everyone is wearing to the ball anyway, but it was to feel the respect come through the storytelling.