Review : Taken by Erin Bowman

Summary (from Goodreads)

Title : Taken (Taken #1)
Author : Erin Bowman
Publication Date : April 16th 2013
Publisher : HarperTeen
Goodreads - The Book Depository

There are no men in Claysoot. There are boys—but every one of them vanishes at midnight on his eighteenth birthday. The ground shakes, the wind howls, a blinding light descends…and he’s gone.

They call it the Heist.

Gray Weathersby’s eighteenth birthday is mere months away, and he’s prepared to meet his fate–until he finds a strange note from his mother and starts to question everything he’s been raised to accept: the Council leaders and their obvious secrets. The Heist itself. And what lies beyond the Wall that surrounds Claysoot–a structure that no one can cross and survive.

Climbing the Wall is suicide, but what comes after the Heist could be worse. Should he sit back and wait to be taken–or risk everything on the hope of the other side?
Personal Thoughts


Taken by Erin Bowman promised to be a thrilling and exciting new YA dystopian from the blurb. Although the ideas behind the book were fresh and unique, the execution of the story line was disastrous, in my opinion.

My first issue with this book were the characters. I found it hard it to identify with any of them. One reason for that was their lack of development. Gray was an unlikable character. He definitely had a fire to him to could have made him an appealing character, but his poor decisions and impulsive nature was a bit too much for me. I also thought that his voice didn't come out as strong enough. Gray tried to be a headstrong and bold character throughout the book, but for some reason I thought of his strength as stupidity. His inability to think before making decisions was frustrating for me as a reader and I just wanted to shake him to his senses. The first love interest, Emma, was as baffling as Gray. I never got to understand her character because she, like Gray, lacked the depth that I like to see in my characters. I also never could grasp her choices and her way of thinking. When we first meet her, she strongly dislikes Gray, but only after a couple of days spending time with him, she is ready to run away with him. I never understood what led her to change her views on Gray so rapidly. The other characters were also quite bland according to me. I wished they had more personality, but none of them really piqued my interest, not even the villain. The thing is, I didn't care for these characters as much as I wanted to. In short, the characters in Taken were sadly lacking and left a lot to be desired.

The plot was peppered with mystery and suspense. As soon I immersed myself in the book, I was intrigued and I was dying to know what was going on, but somewhere along the way, I found my thoughts drifting away from the book and I wasn't enjoying the book as much as I wanted to. There was just TOO much going on in Taken and it was confusing me and the book failed to hold my attention. Like I mentioned above, Taken has an original concept, but because of the way it was handled, it just wasn't as appealing and exciting as it could have been. As mean as this might sound, Taken bored me although it had a promising premise that could have been an intense and electrifying read. Moreover, the romance was, simply put, dreadful. Gray has been in love with Emma for the longest time, but I never embraced why he loved her so much. Also, his love for Emma wasn't as palpable as I expected it to be. Like I said above, Emma dislikes Gray when the reader first encounters them, but that changes in a matter of days. To top it all off, later on in the book, a love triangle was introduced and there was some cheating and using of one another to make the other one jealous that infuriated me because this book would have been fine without its introduction. All in all, the romance was a mess and I honestly didn't care for any of the love interests. The writing itself wasn't bad and I genuinely think that Erin Bowman is a promising author, but the poor execution of this novel just made it an unlikable read for me.

Taken by Erin Bowman just wasn't the read for me. Although I personally did not have much luck with this book, that might not be the case for you. If you can handle all the issues that I had with the book, then I'm sure you would enjoy the book. Unfortunately, this book did not impress me at all and I doubt I will read the next installment.

Rating

Cover : 4/5
Plot : 1/5
Characters : 1/5
Writing : 2/5

**Actual overall rating : 1.5/5**