It was like a nightmare, but there was no waking up. When the night began, Nora had two best friends and an embarrassingly storybook one true love. When it ended, she had nothing but blood on her hands and an echoing scream that stopped only when the tranquilizers pierced her veins and left her in the merciful dark. But the next morning, it was all still true: Chris was dead. His girlfriend Adriane, Nora's best friend, was catatonic. And Max, Nora's sweet, smart, soft-spoken Prince Charming, was gone. He was also—according to the police, according to her parents, according to everyone—a murderer.
Desperate to prove his innocence, Nora follows the trail of blood, no matter where it leads. It ultimately brings her to the ancient streets of Prague, where she is drawn into a dark web of secret societies and shadowy conspirators, all driven by a mad desire to possess something that might not even exist. For buried in a centuries-old manuscript is the secret to ultimate knowledge and communion with the divine; it is said that he who controls the Lumen Dei controls the world. Unbeknownst to her, Nora now holds the crucial key to unlocking its secrets. Her night of blood is just one piece in a puzzle that spans continents and centuries. Solving it may be the only way she can save her own life.
That's it. I give up. Sixty four percent the way through this book and I just can't take it anymore! It's confusing and slow and I really hoped it wouldn't be because the premise sounded fantastic but after disliking Skinned as well I can clearly say that Robin Wasserman's writing just does not do it for me.
I'm not one to post completely negative reviews and this book did have some pretty good things about it. I loved Nora, she was a great main characters and the reason that I stuck this book out for so long and I really liked how raw Wasserman made her, she goes through some pretty hard times in this book and stayed strong all the way through. I also liked the premise, the plot was fantastic I just don't think that it was dealt with as well as it could have been.
I've heard this book reffered to as similar to The Da Vinci Code, so when it started out slow I stuck it out because that book had started slow or me too but I absolutely loved it by the end and there were a few parts in this book where I thought that it was picking up and then we go back to the slow pace and once again I'm back to picking it up and putting it down.
The other characters were also a let down to me. Max -was- the perfect boyfriend but I could see that he had a secret and I could guess what it was (and from reading spoilers after I gave up, just to see if my hunch was right I know I was correct), Adriane I didn't like at all, she was just superficial and weak and more of a liability than a sidekick and how could she do what she did to Nora!? Eli was a character that was just too shady and 'cool' for my liking, I just could not bring myself to liking him.
If what you like is hidden secrets and mysteries and betrayals, you may still want to give this a chance, but for me it was definitely not my cup of tea.
Overall Rating: DID NOT FINISH
Released April 10th by Random House Childrens
Book received as an eGalley from NetGalley in exhange for an honest review
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