The Call

Excellent idea and a nice mystery twist. However, it would have worked so much better if there had been time to get to know and care about the characters. They are pretty blank, all of them (unless you count cliché bully as character development) and so their fates were tragic but not really for who they were, rather how these things would have been tragic for anyone. Like when a stranger has an accident and you feel bad about it, you may even cry, but it's not someone you knew or even loved.
But this was easily one of the quickest reads ever. Very page-turney!

I hope we'll get more character time in the second book so I can learn to like them properly. And then let's not have anything this bad happen to them again, okay?

I think this was a 3.5 star book but I'm rounding up to 4 as Goodreads still doesn't do halves!

Anyway, all in all this was a good book. I read it in about 2 sittings so it certainly kept me interested and gripped enough, however as it was fairly short I did feel some aspects were lacking a bit of explanation or background. I also didn't really connect with any of the characters so wasn't particularly bothered by some events which impacted them.

Finally, the ending didn't really provide any closure which I suppose the author was going for as the whole book seemed to be more of a snapshot of the ongoing situation. Whilst I don't think there is really an opportunity for a sequel, I don't think he meant to give us closure. We are left wondering if the future is that bleak.

As said, all in all I did enjoy this quick and enthralling read, I think I would have just preferred a few more details to have been fleshed out more.

“The Call” is the first in a duology written by Peadar Ó Guilín. The novel is set in a time when the humans had banished the Sidhe, which are like Fae, to a horrible land, and teenagers are ‘Called' to this place, in the human world, the ‘Call” lasts three minutes, but in the Sidhe's world, the ‘Call' lasts twenty-four hours. During the ‘Call' the human teenagers have to fight to survive, because most of the people who had been ‘Called' either come back dead and mutilated, or if your ‘lucky' you come back alive and mutilated.
The novel follows Nessa is determined to survive the ‘Call', even though people think that she would die due to her polio-twisted legs. Nessa is currently going to school, learning how to survive. Throughout the year she witnesses, a few of her classmates get ‘Called'.
I thought the novel would be bloodier, but it wasn't that gruesome, the novel was interesting. I did not like the novel as much as I thought, it was okay, I gave the novel a 3/5 Stars.