Hope's Daughter By Melanie Cusick-Jones

Monday 6 February 2012

Hello everyone, I was sent a copy of this book from the author to review. I got sent it a while ago so sorry for the delay but I have been unusually busy. So many books so little time. Anyway Hope's Daughter is a dystopia/sci-fi novel but don't be put of by the genre. Usually when someone says the word sci-fi I automatically picture Star Wars or something like that but this is completely different. Hope's Daughter follows a young girl called Cassie as she lives her "normal" life in a perfect world. She has always believed everything she was told was true, that is until she meets Balik. When I say meets I mean they've known each other a long time but never properly. Balik has doubts about their supposedly perfect world, but who will be right?
Here's the synopsis:

"Life should be simple for Cassie.
For the small population of Earth survivors who live on the Space Station Hope everything they do is planned and scheduled, down to the cyclical food menus, their roles in the station, even how many children they have. Despite rigid controls directing her life, Cassie feels more out of synch than ever and worries she won’t find a place for herself within the station community. Perhaps that’s because she’s hearing things inside her head that can’t possibly be real. Or maybe it’s the regular elopements of her peers, heading off to a romantic future in the Married Quarter of the space station, whilst she’s never even been attracted to a boy – no matter how hard her best friend Ami pushes them at her. Then there are the odd questions her work placement partner Balik keeps raising. His questions are just as troubling for her as his distracting smiles and eyes that seem to see inside her. As Cassie draws closer to Balik she finds that everything else in her life begins to shift. He tells her things that call into question the system they live within. She can't believe he is right, but at the same time she finds it hard to deny the sincerity of his ideas. Could there be a connection between Cassie’s problems and Balik’s questions? The truth will drag them both to a terrifying and deadly conclusion beyond anything they could have imagined."

Personally I really enjoyed this book, it was completely different to anything I had read before. It was really interesting and the storyline really raised many questions in my head which I got the answers to later on in the book. It's one of those books that you try and work out before the ending. I admit halfway through I thought I had worked it out but when I got to the end I realised I was partly right but the true depth of the story I had no clue about. I would recommend this book to anyone who would enjoy intriguing, complicated stories. I would rate this book 4.5/5 stars.
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 Email me at: confessionsofabookaholic@LIVE.CO.UK

4 People dared to comment.:

Miri said...

Sounds pretty interesting. I'm into dystopian novels since some weeks now, but I'm actually not too much into the whole technical thing, but more into personal stories and different models of society, so I think that could be a nice book to read for me.
Thanks for the review :)

Emily said...

It is a great book and I'd reccomend Noughts and Crosses to you if you haven't already read it. It fits your description perfectly. I have a review on here if you want to check it out.

Michael Cargill said...

Sounds interesting actually. Is there much actual sci-fi type stuff in it? One of the reasons I liked Battlestar Gallactica was because it concentrated on the political and social stuff more than the making sure that phasers were set to stun.

I have only read two dystopia books before. There was 1984 which was good but depressing. Then there was Fahrenheit 451 which I found a bit dull.

Buried In Print said...

I'm not sure if I'd be a good match for this one, although I do like the sounds of it being sci-fi-that's-not-like-sci-fi, but I did enjoy reading your thoughts on it, and I did add Noughts and Crosses to my challenge reading list; I forgot that it was in this genre, and have long wanted to read it.

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