Eve of Man - Giovanna and Tom Fletcher

AGAINST ALL ODDS, SHE SURVIVED.
THE FIRST GIRL BORN IN FIFTY YEARS.
THEY CALLED HER EVE . . .

All her life Eve has been kept away from the opposite sex. Kept from the truth of her past.

But at sixteen it's time for Eve to face her destiny. Three potential males have been selected for her. The future of humanity is in her hands. She's always accepted her fate.

Until she meets Bram.

Eve wants control over her life. She wants freedom.

But how do you choose between love and the future of the human race?

Blurb taken from Goodreads.

✼

I was so excited to read this book. I'm a huge fan of Tom and Giovanna Fletcher, and have enjoyed Giovanna's books before. I was also intrigued by the idea for the story. The first female born in fifty years; that idea must have taken some careful thought in order for it to work. But I'm not afraid of a bit of dystopian fiction!

And I did enjoy the book, especially the first half. It's a unique idea that includes a lot of really great characters, and I was convinced it was a book that I wouldn't be able to put down. And that was true, for the most part, although the second half did feel a little more rushed than I would have liked, which took away the 'wow-factor'.

Rating: ✫✫✫✫

SPOILER ALERT

The Story

I originally wasn't sure about the plot of this book, because I knew it would have needed a lot of careful planning in order to make it feasible. It could so easily have gone wrong, and would have taken just a tiny plot-hole to do so. I wondered how the story could be sustainable; all women (when Eve is 16) over the age of 66, and the rest of the characters men. It was surely a difficult idea to make work. But, that being said, I made it halfway through and didn't come across a single loophole. In fact, I loved it.

I especially liked the idea of Holly the hologram. It's a really interesting touch when you consider that Eve would have had no interaction with another girl, and the way Bram and the others manipulate her is really cool. I also thought that the idea of the Potentials, and the way they were selected as matches for Eve, was a great idea, especially in this genre of book. I actually would have liked to have seen a little more on this process, as the book sets it up as though this is going to play a much more significant role in the story. However, it did serve the purpose of giving Bram a way in to meet Eve, and I really enjoyed that sequence of events. It was good to see the connection Eve has with Bram, and the recognition in her when they unexpectedly meet. I also really liked the relationship between Bram and Hartman during these scenes.

It was also intriguing to get to know Bram's father, and their complicated relationship. It's a bit of a cliché that our hero's father is a big bad wolf, but it really does work in the context of this story. I could tell that he definitely knew more than he was letting on about Eve's parents, and was waiting to find out what that was. The problem is, there was a lot of waiting around to be had in the story.

Just over halfway through, and Bram has escaped. Eve, meanwhile is holed up with the Mothers. She's going through her own personal hell, which must be awful for her, but it just felt a little dull in places. It just came to a little bit of a standstill and needed to go somewhere. Then, suddenly, the rest of the story did a complete turnaround and was very rushed. Frost and Johnny die, and I could sense that this was supposed to be a really sad moment in the story, but I didn't even really know them! They hadn't had their characters established enough for it to have any impact at all. It was a little like, let's break in, get Ernie, and oh look, our friends are dead. There was no build up, and no suspense. It was literally that simple, and I found it so frustrating! This was such a great idea for a story, and the first half of the book set it all up so well! I just wish there would have been more care taken in the second half of the story too. I had such high hopes and they were met for the first half; it's such a shame that the rest got a little lost.

The Verdict

I really, really wanted to love this book. Like, I really wanted to love it. And there were so many thing that I did love about it. It really was a unique and fantastic idea, and I was so excited about it. Eve and Bram are really strong, solid, yet vulnerable characters, and the first half of the book was a real struggle to put down. The story around the Potentials, the very different lives of Eve and Bram, and the events leading up to them meeting - all of them were very exciting. 

Sadly, when Bram escapes, the book becomes a little more confused. It slows almost to a standstill, then suddenly events are moving so fast that it's impossible to have any real connection with the story. I found that all of the really wonderful elements of the book that were established in the first half of the book were kind of undone in the second. All in all, I did still love it, but nowhere near as much as I really had wanted to. I'll definitely be reading the next instalments, but I hope they'll revert back to the engaging nature of storytelling that the series began with.