Recent Reads: Atlantia by Ally Condie

Atlantia by Ally Condie

Publisher: Dutton Childrens
Publication Date:  October 28. 2014

 

Format: Hardback
Source: Recieved an ebook from Penguin First to Read back in October and never got around to reading it, so I borrowed a copy from my library.

Rating: DNF (stopped at page 200)


Goodreads Synopsis: 

Can you hear Atlantia breathing?

For as long as she can remember, Rio has dreamt of the sand and sky Above—of life beyond her underwater city of Atlantia. But in a single moment, all her plans for the future are thwarted when her twin sister, Bay, makes an unexpected decision, stranding Rio Below. Alone, ripped away from the last person who knew Rio’s true self—and the powerful siren voice she has long hidden—she has nothing left to lose.

Guided by a dangerous and unlikely mentor, Rio formulates a plan that leads to increasingly treacherous questions about her mother’s death, her own destiny, and the complex system constructed to govern the divide between land and sea. Her life and her city depend on Rio to listen to the voices of the past and to speak long-hidden truths. 

 Review: 
I tried SO hard to get through this book and enjoy it, but sadly I could not. When I originally requested the arc from Penguin, I thought it was about mermaids... or sirens like the scary kind I have read about in other books but this was not the case. 

What I found with Atlantia was just a slow moving plot line - in the first chapter Rio's sister, Bay, leaves for the Above and I read up until about 200 pages and Rio is still figuring out a way up to ask her why. Now this would have been fine if there was other stuff happened as build up but really everything that happened just seems lack-luster. Rio begins to question the system - but doesn't do anything about it, her aunt becomes part of her life - but she seems fine with it overall, and there is a cute guy - only, she is being detached and off-putting toward him so romance didn't really happen in those first 200 pages either. Everything that should have pulled me in, just didn't.


I really wanted to enjoy this book, and I feel like I stuck it out for about 100 pages more than others the DNFed it, but still nothing - I just wanted to take a nap (and once I even did fall asleep while reading it :/)