I have incredibly mixed feelings toward The Scorpion Rules. On one hand, the story was definitely unique, it was diverse, and I was absolutely intrigued. On the other, I didn't care much about the characters, which made it harder to care about what was happening to them.
Things I Liked:
- First, the fact that kids were coming from around the world is a plus in itself. The fact that they were hostages in this place as a deterrent for war? Fabulous! The concept as a whole was pretty fabulous
- The villain is kind of hilarious. I laughed out loud a few times at what Talis (an AI) had to say about things. Yeah, he did some awful stuff, but I don't know that he was awful, or just trying to do what he thought needed to be done.
- There were other lighthearted moments among the hostages, which was nice because they were trying to make the best of a really horrible situation.
- The political landscape intrigued me a lot. Even more, the psychology behind the things the leaders have done or intended to do fascinated me. Because anyone who declared war needed to realize that to do so, they were effectively killing their own kid, which is super messed up!
And the Things I Didn't:
- The characters were pretty "blah" overall. Sadly, Greta may have been the one I cared least about. At least the others had personality quirks, and even though Elian's rebellious streak was annoying, he had some personality. I never really connected with Greta. It wasn't that I disliked her, I just didn't really like her that much either. The threat of her death didn't affect me as much since I kind of didn't care.
- I was really confused about some of the world-building. How did this particular AI come to power? What about other AIs? What does the world look like now? And of course, what precipitated this huge shift? Those questions were huge, and I never really got sufficient answers. I also had basically no idea what the AIs were supposed to look like, so in my head, this was them:
- The love triangle seemed unnecessary at best. I didn't really feel much chemistry with either love interest, but Greta went back and forth in her head for so long that I completely lost interest in who she'd eventually end up with.
Bottom Line: This one is also apparently getting a companion novel, which is partly why I am giving it three stars. The storyline itself was interesting enough to keep me going, and maybe we'll get more answers about the world in the next book (and a character that I like more than Greta? Fingers crossed!), and there was enough action to keep me entertained. A few more answered questions and more likable characters could have made this one fabulous.
*Copy provided by publisher for review