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Saturday, March 15, 2014

ARC Review: The Wicked We Have Done by Sarah Harian

The Wicked We Have Done by Sarah Harian
Goodreads
Published: March 18, 2014

Summary

Evalyn Ibarra never expected to be an accused killer and experimental prison test subject. A year ago, she was a normal college student. Now she’s been sentenced to a month in the compass room—an advanced prison obstacle course designed by the government to execute justice.

If she survives, the world will know she’s innocent.

Locked up with nine notorious and potentially psychotic criminals, Evalyn must fight the prison and dismantle her past to stay alive. But the system prized for accuracy appears to be killing at random.

She doesn’t plan on making friends.

She doesn’t plan on falling in love, either.


~Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a chance to review this book. In no way did this sway my opinion.~
A tale with Hunger Game elements with a more sinister aspect and I loved every second of it, THE WICKED WE HAVE DONE is a book to look out for. The romantic aspect of the story was so perfectly tied in with the hard-core survival that the whole book seemed like a dance. And dance where you watch people die and see people survive and watch people fall in love and face their worst sins. It was beautiful. And epic. And you really, really need to read this book.
 "Every criminal put in the Compass Room confronts their guilt. Then they have a choice of being a villain or a coward or a hero.Two of those choices are irredeemable."
The characters are beyond amazing with the whole setting and situation was, well, epic. Okay, so the story follows one girl who supposedly murdered her best friend, some random guy and her best friend’s boyfriend. She chose the option in court where she goes into this arena of sorts and her every emotion is monitored. Her own emotions and how she reacts to her crime determine whether she lives or dies. When she goes into the arena there are more people who chose this option because of their heinous crimes. The good ones committed their crimes to save the ones they loved. The bad ones are irreversible and die quickly. Well, most of them do.  

THE ROMANCE!

THE ACTION!

THE DEATH!


I don’t have much to say because I love it all. The book felt alive and real. It seemed like a future that could happen and it was a story that I will remember and now has a permanent place on my favorite’s shelf. 
"Casey and I . . . we're passionate enough to kill for someone we love. I'm sure many would say they'd do the same. They're liars."

How do you feel when books sort of tie into / relate to other books, like THE WICKED WE HAVE DONE did with THE HUNGER GAMES? Is it a good or bad thing? Or does it not really matter because everything has been done before?



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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousMarch 28, 2014 at 8:13 PM

    I actually really liked the Hunger Games-ish aspects... but I didn't love the book. The Compass Room itself was really cool, and I think it was derivative in a good way, giving a fresh look at a common trope in modern literature.

    I didn't love the book because I didn't really connect with the characters, all of the secondary characters tended to run together and I'd forget who was who, and it felt preachy and didactic in places. It also read like YA, and felt like it had been sold as NA in an attempt to ride a trend and/or be "different." The characters could have been aged down, and any mentions of college changed to high school, and it would have been the same story... so it didn't make much of a case for the NEED to expand the NA category beyond romance (I was hoping it would!)

    But the Compass Room itself felt very real and interesting as a setting and a premise... nothing wrong with being derivative if you do it well!

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    1. JackieJune 23, 2015 at 12:25 PM

      It seems a whole bunch of people liked the hunger games aspect of the wicked we have done...I adore the idea of the compass room more than anything. I think this book plays a lot on the weakness of will and the necessity of humans to have other people to remain sane. If that makes any sense. Humans are naturally social, even introverts need social interaction at some points in their lives. It seemed to me that a lot of the seemingly insane people in this book tried to hard to be alone. Or maybe people stuck away from them because they could feel their sanity slipping...eeks. Thanks for stopping by!
      Jackie

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