Blackbird by Anna Carey Series: Blackbird Duology #1
Published by HarperTEEN on September 2014
Genres: Mystery/Thriller, Young Adult
Pages: 256
Source: Edelweiss
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This twisty, breathless cat-and-mouse thrill ride, told in the second person, follows a girl with amnesia in present-day Los Angeles who is being pursued by mysterious and terrifying assailants.
A girl wakes up on the train tracks, a subway car barrelling down on her. With only minutes to react, she hunches down and the train speeds over her. She doesn’t remember her name, where she is, or how she got there. She has a tattoo on the inside of her right wrist of a blackbird inside a box, letters and numbers printed just below: FNV02198. There is only one thing she knows for sure: people are trying to kill her.
On the run for her life, she tries to untangle who she is and what happened to the girl she used to be. Nothing and no one are what they appear to be. But the truth is more disturbing than she ever imagined.
The Maze Runner series meets Code Name Verity, Blackbird is relentless and action-packed, filled with surprising twists.
This was my first foray into reading Anne Carey, I never read the Eve trilogy and this synopsis intrigued me with its mystery/thriller elements.
Blackbird is one of those stories which has you as confused as the main character for the entirety of the story and its a breath of fresh air. You never feel that Sunny, our protagonist is being stupid or making the wrong choice as if you were in her shoes, you would probably make the same choices or perhaps worse ones. I thoroughly enjoyed the venture into the unknown for the 250ish pages it was incredibly addicting.
The story starts with a girl waking up on train tracks with no memory of who she is or how she came to be there. She has a backpack with some essentials and information explicitly telling her not to involve the police, and she discovers very quickly that there are people intent on killing her. Sunny is not the type to be a sitting duck – I think if I was in her position I would have taken my chances and gone to the police station a gibbering mess. Sunny however has a strength about her and real survival instincts.
The story is told in 2nd person which I didn’t mind however it can give you the feeling that your characters are devoid of personality. It took me awhile to warm up to Sunny but I did really admire her and I was cheering her on more and more as the story went and the mystery started to unravel.
I did start to have a pretty good guess as to what was happening by about half way and I was correct though there were still many things that I wasn’t expecting and one massive cliff-hanger at the end that surprised me completely. This book is well written, fast paced and full of suspense. I can’t wait to read the sequel and get answers to all my questions, this was a great novel.
– Fast paced and full of suspense, this is a great book!
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