Tomorrow Land

by Mari Mancusi

• ISBN10: 1620511967
• ISBN13: 9781620511961
• Publish Date: 23 September 2015 (first published 21 May 2012)
• Publish Status: Active
• Imprint: Nla Digital LLC
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 354
• Language: English

Reviews

[inlibrisveritas]

Tomorrow Land has such a promising concept. Two people who finally come together are torn apart by the apocalypse and then unexpectedly find each other again years later. It’s a tale of a reunion that holds the pain of betrayal and even more reservation than the first time they came together.

The world in which we are introduced is still similar to our own physically but the actual society is ruled by technology. If you want to play sports or hang out then there is a good chance you’ll be doing it in a simulator, and if you don’t like your nose you can get your parents to pay for surgery. I liked that the society was superficial and at the same time much more strict when it came to medicines, news, and such. I didn’t feel like the world was fully realized though and there was a lot of potential to have more about the government explained, however it’s not. This is a stand alone so what you read is what you get, and while I’m glad that Mancusi could tell the whole story in a single book I really think it might have benefited from having at least one more or perhaps more pages. The one thing that I actually thought was a great addition to this was the drug abuse by one of the characters, it’s not something you see a lot in YA lit. It actually touches on a bit of mentality behind it and how it can go from being something that is needed to something that purely desired. The ‘zombies’ are interesting and still fairly human like, which I thought was a great addition to this but again it’s not a new concept.

Peyton and Chris are two people on opposite ends of the spectrum socially before the apocalypse, but both have their issues. Peyton’s is that she has a rather eccentric father who is obsessed with the possibility of their being an apocalypse and Chris is a bit awkward. It’s a well-used scenario and a bit expected, two people forced together by some rather odd developments. I did like Chris though, he’s really sweet and sees the value in Peyton when she doesn’t. However it took me quite a while to like Peyton, and even in the end I was still rather unfond of her. She’s a girl who is trained to take care of herself and she can hold her own in a fight, but mentally she’s more unsure and I found her personality a bit irritating. Thanks to her father she has some rather interesting accessories which instead of finding them cool I found them to be a bit silly.

I think overall I found the book to be okay and while it doesn’t really add anything new to the genre it’s still a decent read for an afternoon of reading.

I received this in exchange for an honest review

[Amber]

AMAZING. Full review here: http://www.booksofamber.com/2012/04/tomorrow-land-by-mari-mancusi.html

This. Was. Amazing! I was so shocked at how much I enjoyed this book, and I'm also shocked at how few people have read this.

The points of view in this novel switch between Peyton and Chase, and also from 'Then' and 'Now', so we get to see inside both of their heads at two completely different times. This was great because it showed the changes that the two characters had gone through since the Plague hit, and how they are now. It also shows how some things are still the same.

I really liked both Peyton and Chase (okay, I adored him, but whatever). I may have almost cried at one point towards the end because I just loved them both so much and their relationship had had so many bumps. I was just thinking "When is this going to end?!"

I also loved Tank (or Trey), Chase's older brother. He was the 'leader' of their little group of kids and he was so adorable. I also liked the other secondary characters such as Helga and David, although we didn't see too much of them. The only character that I despised was Peyton's father, and I felt so sorry for her and her mother at times because he was just such a prat.

There were lots of twists in this book, some that I was expected and some that I definitely wasn't! The ending completely shocked me.

I really wasn't expecting Tomorrow Land to be as amazing as it was. It was a thrilling novel that was brilliantly written. It's definitely the best zombie novel I have read!