Wednesday, April 02, 2014

Review: The Wicked We Have Done by Sarah Harian

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Review: The Wicked We Have Done by Sarah HarianThe Wicked We Have Done by Sarah Harian
Series: Chaos Theory #1
Published by Intermix on March 18th 2014
Genres: New Adult, Thriller
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four-stars

Evalyn Ibarra never expected to be an accused killer and experimental prison test subject. A year ago, she was a normal college student. Now she’s been sentenced to a month in the compass room—an advanced prison obstacle course designed by the government to execute justice.

If she survives, the world will know she’s innocent.

Locked up with nine notorious and potentially psychotic criminals, Evalyn must fight the prison and dismantle her past to stay alive. But the system prized for accuracy appears to be killing at random.

She doesn’t plan on making friends.

She doesn’t plan on falling in love, either.

A funny, recurring conversation I always have with my friends is about the stark contrast between books I like and movies I like.  See, I love me a good action movie. Give me Jason Statham, Mark Wahlberg or a nice gory horror film any day of the week. But when it comes to reading, I want the “chick-flicks” I want heartbreak, I want emotion, I want to be left so emotionally wrecked that I can’t even see through my tears.  The Wicked We Have done brought everything that I like in movies so perfectly to a book that it surprisingly worked incredibly well for me!

What struck me right off the bat with this one was how original it was. First of all there is the fact that it is an NA novel and it’s not just a sexy-times romance about two broken characters coming together and boinking, how refreshing is that? I loved the idea of these criminals being thrown into an area and tested to see where their morality lies and if they are a fit for the death penalty or not.  I mean that’s the big argument against the death penalty right? The system isn’t perfect and what if an innocent loses their life.  But in the world of The Wicked We Have Done they have created a system that implants a chip into the back of a criminals head and they throw them into a Compass Room where they are faced with tests and their reactions are constantly monitored.  Cool, hey? What made this so intense was that there was genuinely good people in this dome and there were also people who were out for blood. And was there ever blood, people exploding, stabbings, shootings, you name it.  The action scenes were excellently written and the pacing was kept up so well that I was on the edge of my seat for the entirety of the novel.  After mentioning all of the blood and gore in these pages I’m not sure what it says about me that I had so much fun reading it, but I did!

As I am sure you can guess from above, we are greeted to some very… interesting characters in this novel.  Our MC Evalyn was someone that I came to like quite a bit by the end of the story.  She is very closed off when we meet her and struggling with all that has come about since she committed her crime (which we find out more about through flashbacks in the story.)  She proves to be really strong and intelligent in the Compass Room and I loved being in her head.  There is a bit of insta-love when it comes to her and Casey, which I could have done without but I do see and understand what the romance added to the story and Evalyn’s will to live.  She wasn’t the only one finding herself in this room, we are treated to a budding lesbian romance which was really refreshing and didn’t feel insta-lovey to me at all.  I really liked Jace and Valerie. Oh and there is also the young brainy boy Tanner who I liked for all of his technical thinking as he tried to figure out the inner workings of the Compass Room.  So yea, I liked the characters and even the really bad ones that they were thrown into the room with served to keep me highly entertained.

One thing I did long for a bit more in the story was a more about the character, Nick.  He came into Evalyn’s life prior to her crime and it’s made clear that he was a big part of it.  Through Evalyn we are led to not trust him at all and know he is not a good person but I wanted more to define just how crazy bad he was.  I was trying to explain this to a friend and it got me all tongue twisted, but the best way to put it is that I didn’t NEED more to enforce his darkness but I just WANTED more.  I was perfectly ok to believe he was as twisted as we are led to believe but I wanted to read more about what made him tick.  Maybe a novella could be in the works? A girl can dream, right?

If you are looking for a thrill ride, Sarah Harian’s debut is sure to fit the bill.  I will anxiously be awaiting anything (AHEM, see above paragraph) that comes out in this series.

four-stars

4 Hot Espressos

24 Responses to “Review: The Wicked We Have Done by Sarah Harian”

  1. Nick @ Nick's Book Blog

    “it’s not just a sexy-times romance about two broken characters coming together and boinking, how refreshing is that?”
    LOL! Yes, to this. I’m loving that NA is finally beginning to branch out into genres other than contemporary. I’m so happy to hear you loved this one. I’m like you too. I love a good action movie as much as you, so I think this is going to appeal to me. I also love the idea of criminals thrown into an area. I’ll be checking my library catalog for this.
    Lovely review, Jenni!

  2. Rashika

    This would have definitely been a 4 star read for me had some things been different but I just couldn’t except some of the explanations provided so I ended up being enraged and just couldn’t enjoy it anymore. I am still looking forward to the sequel but I won’t be nearly as enthusiastic about it as I was about reading this book.

    I am glad to hear you had better luck than I did with this one though!! 🙂

    Lovely review, Jenni!! 🙂

  3. Nereyda @Mostly YA Book Obsessed

    I loved this one! This to me is real NA. Books with hormone filled characters that are humping each other every chance they get need to stop passing off as NA.
    I’m excited for the next book in this series. I love that the author made her characters as dark as she did. She promised us books about killers and boy did she deliver 🙂

  4. Christianna

    I’ve gotten tired of boinking NA books, but this one sounds like it’s a total winner and totally unique. Your review makes me wanna go use that dangerous buy now button on Amazon. It sounds like a total thrill ride and I love one of those. I also love action flicks and horror films and if this worked for you I have a feeling that it would work for me too! Great review!

  5. Tanja

    This is so interesting as I’m like you! I love good action movie and that’s pretty much only kind of move I watch lately. Just to have good action and nice storyline and I’m happy, but when it comes to books I don’t think I have ever read any book just focused on action and I don’t think I’d like it either. I need emotion and to feel so much while reading. You have no idea how happy I’m to hear that this one really worked for you. I need to read too. Great review, Jenni 🙂

        • Jenni

          Luckily this is a book I purchased and read on my own so I didn’t have to send the review off to a publisher. When I first started blogging I read a Penguin book and sent met review off and the publicist responded correcting the MC’s name. I guess maybe I’m not good with names? LOL!

  6. Pili

    Ok, this totally sounds like a NA I’d probably want to read! I’m adding it to the TBR list for sure!
    Thanks for a great review, Jenni!

  7. Faye @ The Social Potato

    I have this book but there’s actually a part of me that’s hesitant to continue. There’s so much hype built around this book, not to mention it being a fiery lesbian romance, that I’m almost scared it will disappoint me. It’s been sitting on my Currently Reading shelf for AGES o_O The idea and premise are interesting, though, so I have to give it that. Your review made me reconsider it <3 I shall be reading it soon-ish 😀

  8. Melliane

    Oh I didn’t pay attention that it was a NA book, I thought it was a YA one. But in any case it sounds really good and different and this is always so interesting!

  9. Kayla

    The cover of this book is beyond gorgeous and your review was really great. It makes me wish that I have The Wicked We Had Done in my hands right now, haha!

  10. Mary @ BookSwarm

    It WAS really interesting! I actually liked that these weren’t innocent but convicted people. They’d committed a big crime (for whatever reason) and were paying the price. Crazy morality test though! Crazy!