I wanted to read this book because I wanted to read more of authors I enjoyed. I adored the Divergent series so much so that I’ve got the Ferris wheel with Tris and Four climbing it tattooed on my leg, I’ve not really enjoyed her other work, but saw this book was being released and wanted to give her another shot and unfortunately it was missing something. 

This book is based on Sonya Kantor, and she knows the slogan what’s right is right, she lived by it for most of her life. For decades, everyone in the Seattle-Portland megalopolis lived under it, as well as constant surveillance in the form of the Insight, an ocular implant that tracked every word and every action, rewarding or punishing by a rigid moral code set forth by the Delegation. Then there was a revolution. The Delegation fell. Its most valuable members were locked in the Aperture, a prison on the outskirts of the city. And everyone else, now free from the Insight’s monitoring, went on with their lives. Sonya was the former poster girl for the Delegation, has been imprisoned for ten years when an old enemy comes to her with a deal: find a missing girl who was stolen from her parents by the old regime, and earn her freedom. The path Sonya takes to find the child with lead her through an unfamiliar, crooked post-Delegation world where she finds herself digging deeper into the past and her family’s dark secrets than she ever wanted to. 

I liked the world building and obviously this was released during COVID, and it would have been hard-hitting when we were in the midst of lockdown. I liked Sonya’s character development and how even though she felt guilty for what happened to Grace, she wanted her parents to have the truth. She could have easily covered it up and just said she was taken, and she’s died but she also told her parents that she was the one who reported Grace for being a second child. I liked the mystery aspect of the book and that’s what kept me reading, I wanted to know what happened to Grace and who killed Knox and who was after Sonya. I'm glad that there was little romance throughout the book as well because I feel like sometimes a lot of dystopian books are like the government is tracking them and trying to kill them, but they love each other so the world is good. There was a romantic connection, but it wasn’t the focus point of the book.  

I would have loved for this to have a bit more depth and history like a couple of chapters where it was before the revelation, how did it come to this point? Why did Sonya’s dad go bad? Was it for money? Power? Did her mum and sister know? I wanted more to do with the government and her dad. I wanted more history with Sonya and the brothers? Something was missing and I wanted more unlike Divergent, Veronica Roth manages to build the world and the history, and you know everyone and everything before the action happens.  

Overall, this book is enjoyable, but it was just missing something, and I was wanting more.