Why did I start reading it? I'm in a group on Facebook called 'Navigating Indieworld' (Highly suggest taking a look) and the author, Shari Sakurai, was having a feature day. I enjoyed what she talked about and it made me excited to read what she has written. When she did a giveaway I entered as fast as I could and won my own copy of her book, Perfect World.
What is it? In a future world ravaged by global warming cities survive in shielded pockets, building technology and surviving. London has it's own troubles though. The villain, Adam Larimore, has taken over the north and blocked it off with shields. It's up to Eric, a genetically enhanced superhuman, and the rest of the London Security Agency to stop him and reclaim half of London.
What are the characters like? Characters were generally likeable. There was no one I really hated and the ones I'm meant to hate I just wondered about their motivations and look forward to finding out. I was really curious about a character called Bex. She's in an interesting situation. A fellow agent of the LSA, she poses as Eric's girlfriend to give him a good public image when in reality she doesn't seem to like him all that much and has to sneak around with her real boyfriend. Going into this book without reading the blurb or having really any idea what I was getting into I was wondering if she was going to be the love interest but was pleasantly surprised on that front and generally found this dynamic quite interesting. I would have loved to see the two interact more in this awkward situation but I guess the fact that she basically avoided him was telling in itself.
Anyone particularly cool? Eric himself though was good at keeping me in the story. He reminded me very much of Superman, a very good boy. The goodest boy. He's simple, he just wants to help people, to save people. It's what he was literally born and trained to do and he knows nothing else. It's sad reading him question everything; be met with a world that won't let him just be good anymore. I want to give him hugs. Many hugs. He is the best boy.
What's the bad news? I really couldn't find any sympathy for our villain, Adam. Conveniently, Eric gets Adam's backstory laid out for him and feels really bad for him because he's the goodest boy with a heart of gold but I didn't end up feeling much for it. It all just felt so avoidable. (Slight spoiler)Adam found out at a young age that his father had lied to him about his mother dying and had used a surrogate, that he had been designed to take over his fathers business and this trigger's his future behaviours but it confuses me slightly. Even Eric points out confusion as to why Adam's father would lie to him. In the world painted by this book genetic engineering has become the normal way to have a child. Sure couples normally go for it and it's their genes that are used but I would imagine in the 1% esk elite that Adam was born into this can't be all that shocking and strange right? Adam's dad can't be the only rich person to want a child heir but not have a partner and not have the time to date because business, right? This just confused me and since it's the triggering event I couldn't really understand the emotions behind the rest. There's a side novel based off it that may answer some of these questions but obviously I haven't read that, yet. There was also two chapters of one of the authors other books at the end and as much as this is a cool thing for a preview I was very confused for a moment. Cliffhanger ending then suddenly, vampires! Would have been nice just to have a bit of explanation before. Just a little author's note saying something like 'Thanks for reading. Here's a preview of another thing I wrote!'.
And the good news? I know it sounds weird but I don't think I'm very good at reading. I really have to focus to read something and get put off by thick books but hot damn, I had no problems with this one. Perfect World flowed amazingly, I found myself flying through the book even though normally I'm a really slow reader. A+ on the general writing of this one. Oh and I HAVE to mention this one section in it because it was just a great use of setting. Eric gets away from his hectic life by viewing simulated recordings of London before it was wrecked. The author explains what happened to lead to this world to this state by having Eric look through the natural history museum's red section which is all about the earth. Having been to London and the natural history museum just last year I could picture the entire thing clearly and it was just an amazing way to bring on the topic of global warming without having to have some clunky dialogue explain it or just dumping it on us out of nowhere. Genius! There was also a good use of the villain's name. The book isn't in first person but it is from Eric's point of view and at the start, we refer to the villain by his last name, Larimore, but later on, we start to read Adam instead and it was a cool way to show Eric's perceptions changing.
Would you recommend? Yeah! Perfect World was so easy to read I know friends that could probably read the whole thing in a few hours. I will be picking up the second book in the series at some point. Overall it's got an interesting sci-fi world and the goodest boy.
I think this is the first sci-fi book I've reviewed on here...huh. Well, even if it's not sci-fi this book liked to make you question things and another book I've read that has done that is Mia and the Forbidden Medicine Report. You can read the review here.