2014 Reading Challenges, Book Reviews, Reviews by Diayll

ARC Review: The Taking (The Taking #1) by Kimberly Derting

I received this book for free from the mentioned source in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book nor the content of my review.



ARC Review: The Taking (The Taking #1) by Kimberly DertingThe Taking by Kimberly Derting
Series: The Taking #1
Published by: HarperTeen on 4/29/2014
Genres: Aliens, Love & Romance, Science Fiction, YA, Young Adult
Pages: 368
Format: eARC
Source: Edelweiss

View on: Goodreads
Grab it: Amazon

Review Score:
About the Book:

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer meets The Fifth Wave in this chilling and explosive new series from author Kimberly Derting. The last thing Kyra Agnew remembers is a flash of bright light. She awakes to discover that five whole years have passed. Everyone in her life has moved on—her parents divorced, her boyfriend is in college and dating her best friend—but Kyra's still the sixteen-year-old she was when she vanished. She finds herself drawn to Tyler, her boyfriend's kid brother, despite her best efforts to ignore her growing attraction. In order to find out the truth, the two of them decide to retrace her steps from that fateful night. They discover there are others who have been

 

 

 

 

 

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A hidden alien invasion masked by an insta-love romance, The Taking feels similar and yet still somehow also becomes an unpredictable science fiction story. Though the beginning 50% of the novel left me unsettled, I quickly fell in love with The Taking as the story progressed past the 60% mark and we continued to discover what really happened to our main character, Kyra, five years ago.

 

Kyra is a normal sixteen year-old girl, who is madly in love with her perfect boyfriend Austin, and has big dreams of going off to college with Austin despite being offered several promising softball scholarships to major universities. After a championship game, Kyra’s father who’s also her number one fan, has his reservations about his daughters decision and tries to reason with her. Let her know that she doesn’t have to attend some mediocre college because of some boy, even if the entire family adores said boy. Soon, their simple discussion escalates into a major fight and Kyra demands that her father pull over to the side of the road so she can get away from him – something I still question. However, what happens next, neither of them expected.

 

First, let’s begin with what I did enjoy. The second half of the book had me on the edge of my seat, toes curling, and heart fluttering. With each turn of the page, I became more engrossed in the what-the-heck-is-really-going-on part of the story. Mainly the parts of the novel that involved non-stop alien talk and had nothing to do with Kyra’s personal struggle with admitting her feelings for Tyler, Austin’s younger (yet somehow insanely hot) brother. When our main character meets an individual who knows about her “situation” and suddenly finds herself on the run, I was hooked. Flipping pages like a mad woman to get to the good parts. I also enjoyed, Tyler and Kyra’s father. Tyler was sweet in ways that made me swoon oh-so-hard for him, and her dad – despite having his problems – was a great character every time he was in a scene. The ending of The Taking had me screaming. I wanted more, can’t wait to read more. Gosh, there are so many unanswered question that my head is still spinning.

 

Despite my love for the action, there are several things that bothered me throughout the story. For one, I don’t know a single parent that will allow their child to demand they pull over to the side of the road and let them out the car. I don’t know, maybe there are those types of parents out there where the kids run the household, but from my experience, if a child demands anything or talks disrespectful to their parents, they get some kind of punishment (mostly grounding). I was pissed when her dad pulled that car over. What the hell????? I just did not see that as being “real”. Another aspect of the story I was not fond of was the insta-love. If you remove the prologue and epilogue, the timeline for the novel is seven days. SEVEN days. Now, I have no problems suspending belief when necessary, but for some reason, I felt it highly unbelievable that Kyra fell in love with Tyler in seven days. Granted, they were seven INSANE days and he’d always admired his brother’s girlfriend from a far, but at the same time she just returned. Just found out some devastating information about her boyfriend and parents. And with her constantly comparing him to Austin, I’m not sure that I buy her feelings for him. It seemed like too much in such a short amount of time. If anything, I expected her to be utterly confused. For her, only a day has passed, but for everyone else, it’s been FIVE years. How can she just immediately drop her feelings for Austin? A guy she’s been in love with for most of her life? It just didn’t make a lick of sense to me. Sorry…

 

Overall, The Taking is a great story. Like any novel there are pros and cons – such as insta-love – however, it’s still a novel I recommend to someone who enjoys science fiction, aliens, messed up families, and swoon worthy romance. I also enjoyed Kimberly Derting’s writing style and can see myself reading more of her work in the near future. Though I would have loved more science fiction and less insta-romance, I still find myself wishing I could get my hands on a copy of book 2.

 

 

My Rating


rate 4Diayll Signature

 

 

 

 

 
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