Review: Fireseed One by Catherine Stine

Book Blurb:

What if only your very worst enemy could help you save the world? Fireseed One, a futuristic YA thriller, is set on a near-future earth with soaring heat, toxic waters, tricked-out amphibious vehicles, ice-themed dance clubs and fish that grow up on vines. Varik Teitur inherits a vast sea farm after the mysterious drowning of his marine biologist father.

When Marisa Baron, a beautiful and shrewd terrorist, who knows way too much about Varik's father's work, tries to steal seed disks from the world's food bank, Varik is forced to put his dreams of becoming a doctor on hold and venture with her, into a hot zone teeming with treacherous nomads and a Fireseed cult who worships his dead father, in order to search for Fireseed, a seemingly magical hybrid plant that may not even exist.

My Review:

2 Out Of 5 Stars

Genre: Another-World, Dystopian, Mystery, Survival--

Can I just mention that the updated cover is so pretty and much better than the older cover with the people on it. And not to sound like a cover snob, but I probably would not have picked this book to read if I had seen the original cover. Also, the book blurb I read was concise and interesting, but when I looked the book on Goodreads I was blown away by the book description. It was long winded and did not really sound like the book that I had just read about, but yes, it was the same book. It is amazing how a new cover and cute little book blurb can really change perspective.

Here is the original cover:

See?? The new cover is soo pretty, and I guess this makes me a cover snob :(

I really enjoy fantasy stories that drop the reader right into the middle of things, without the slow building of the world first to bore me. Learning about the world as I read about what the characters is doing helps me to stay engaged and interested in the book. Unfortunately, I never fully grasped what was going on in this story. I kept on plugging through (as is my way, much to my friends disgust), but at some moments the words I read did not even comprehend in my brain. To put it mildly, I was lost by this book. I am a huge urban fantasy and paranormal reader, but maybe this was a little too fantasy for me. Almost nothing about the story was familiar or recognizable in the book, except that there were people (aka Varik the main character who seemed like a really nice guy), a dolphin (the best part of the story), greed and maybe they were still on earth (but that is debatable). The thing most talked about and seemingly prized in the book was agar, which is something that I use in my science labs to grow things (such as bacteria) on, but I don’t even know if this is supposed to be the same agar as that. In case you can’t tell by my ramblings, I was really lost here. That being said, I am sure that a lot of people will really like this complicated involved world, it just was not for me. Give it a whirl if you are looking for a new fantasy book to be submerged in (ha, I thought that was applicable pun since they use water crafts...).

I received this title from the publisher in return for my honest review.