Friday 5 January 2018

This Mortal Coil (This Mortal Coil #1), by Emily Suvada

Hey guys, this is Abi here,
And I've kind of thrown reviews to the side in the past couple of months. Granted, I did say I only wanted to post reviews for books that I have a lot of thoughts on, but I haven't posted any in months!
So, why not start the year with a review? I finished this book last night and it is the perfect time to post a review!
Enjoy!

Title: This Mortal Coil
Author: Emily Suvada
Genre: Sci-fi
Release date: 30th October, 2017
Status: Book 1 in a trilogy
Pages: 450
Blurb: "My darling girl, if you're reading this, it means
I am dead. I know you want to grieve,
but there is something I need you to do.

When a lone soldier, Cole, arrives with news of
Lachlan Agatta's death, all hope seems lost for Catarina.
Her father was the world's leading geneticist, and
humanity's best hope of beating a devastating virus.
Then, hidden beneath Cole's genehacked enhancements,
she finds a message of hope: Lachlan created a vaccine.
But only she can find and decrypt it... if she can
unravel the clues he left for her.

The closer she gets, the more she finds herself at risk from
Cartaxus, a shdowy organization with the stronghold on
the world's genetic tech. But it's too late to turn back.
There are three billion lives at stake, two people who can
save them, and one final secret that Cat can unlock.
A secret that will change everything."

My Thoughts
Reading through this: I was trying to decide "Do I like this?" Because, to be honest, it could have gone either way.
There were factors I liked, but there were factors that could have been done better, in my opinion.

The story starts with Catarina, her father, and her (more than) friend Dax are coding, when Cartaxus (a company that has taken over basically) arrive to take Catarina's father, and Dax under their will. Catarina is warned to stay away, to never let them take her.
The story continues two years later, when Catarina is left fatherless and penniless, in the struggle to survive the Hydra Virus, a Virus that makes people explode within three days of having been infected. Of course, there's one immunisation: To eat living flesh of the people that have been infected. There's also the Wrath, a condition that takes control of your brain and your body, so that the only thing you want to do is feast on other's living flesh.
So, that feeling of survival was something that was done really well.

A recurring theme that was also done well was the intensity. It was a high intensity novel overall, and it was basically a race against time, to release the vaccine that Catarina's father created before the world dies out, and the mix between the need to save the world as well as the intensity was something that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Also, Suvada was on point with the end of each chapter. Each time I picked up this book, I was always thinking "One more chapter". But as soon as I got to the end, something would happen that would want me to carry on reading it. These end of chapters were why I read this so quickly, despite  the length of the story.

Those are the points that I enjoyed. This is what I thought needed work.
First of all, at the start, I really had to commit to the story and reading through the start. Not only was it kind of info dumpy at the start (though this was kind of necessary because I wouldn't have understood half of it if it hadn't been like that- another bad point, which I'll get to in a minute.)
But what I'm getting at is that the explanations could have more spread out, and smoother, instead of just info dumping each part all at once.

Also, I felt like you have to be a major sci-fi fan to want to carry on reading, especially at the start (this is what I was talking about a second ago). But the jargon used in this book, was so scientific, that I could barely digest myself through it to get the gist of what they were talking about. I got that it was a sci-fi language heavy story, but what could have definitely have been done better was to tone down the language used to explain all the sci-fi elements to the story.

Also, the characters. They were all super smart, but that was really their only redeeming quality. The rest I'd already seen somewhere before. Catarina's character development was decent, and it was something that I wasn't expecting, but I got the feeling that it could have been bigger. I didn't see it coming, like at all, but looking back, I felt that they could have been covered up, so I was more surprised in the long run.

Overall, it was a decent read. There were some things that I could have been written in better, and some parts to be improved on, but overall, it was a solid 4 star read, and I would be happy to continue, especially the way the story was left. There are a few things that I hope they carry on, but at this point I have no clue as to how the story will go.
I would recommend this to anybody that love heavy sci-fi and is in the mood to start a new series!

So that is my review of This Mortal Coil, by Emily Suvada! I hope you enjoyed it, and let me know in the comments what you thought!
I hope you have a lovely weekend, and I will see you all on Monday!
Byeeeee!

-Abi xxxxx





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