The Evaporation of Sofi Snow by Mary  Weber

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Category: Young Adult
Genre: Sci-fi


 
Ever since the Delonese ice-planet arrived eleven years ago, Sofi's dreams have been vivid. Alien. In a system where Earth's corporations rule in place of governments and the humanoid race orbiting the moon are allies, her only constant has been her younger brother, Shilo. As an online gamer, Sofi battles behind the scenes of Earth's Fantasy Fighting arena where Shilo is forced to compete in a mix of real and virtual blood sport. But when a bomb takes out a quarter of the arena, Sofi's the only one who believes Shilo survived. She has dreams of him. And she's convinced he's been taken to the ice-planet.

Except no one but ambassadors are allowed there.

The Evaporation of Sofi Snow is a YA sci-fi story that I thought had potential, but ended up being just mediocre for me. I thought the games in the book were interesting. The mix of real and virtual reality was an interesting concept but I was a little confused about how exactly it worked. I also felt like the part at the beginning with the games was maybe a bit too long. One of the most interesting parts of the book was the "planet" and the aliens. I'll give you one guess what the planet really was, think Star Wars. Why no one figured this out before a bunch of teens did is beyond me. I really don't care for books that make the teens smarter than the adults.

I really didn't care for any of the characters in the book. Both Sofi and her ex, Miguel had too many issues for me. Sofi is angry with her mother, with good reason, and she is acting out and doing things just to spite her. And Miguel has done some really shady things in his past. These kids are way too young to have so much baggage which is really sad. I think it would have worked better as a story if it had been written about adults. Then maybe we would have been spared the teen angst. There is also the friend Heller who initially seemed really cool, but then got super annoying with his jealousy.

The book ends on a huge cliffhanger and you definitely have to read the next book to find out what happens next, but I'm pretty sure I can predict what is going to happen and what all the secrets probably are, so I'm good leaving it where it is.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher Thomas Nelson for giving me a copy of this book for review.