Author: Elizabeth Norris
Series: (Unraveling #1)**
Published: April 24th 2012 by Balzer + Bray
 

I’m a little lost here. I liked it but not. There were few things in here that felt…weird. For sci-fi book it felt really weird for me. I know I’m not the biggest fan of this genre, but I’ve been open to the idea and Unraveling was definitely not my first (some books of the same genre won me over as a proof). And it’s not because the concepts were not working. It’s just tad wobbly (for me).

But I got to give this book some props, the idea was new. But by no means it was original; the concept of parallel universes was done before but I think this is the first time I stumbled upon a YA book with this theme. However, there’s something really strange with it that characters, the romance, the science and everything else that for me felt disconnected. But I admit there were interesting moments. And some parts that I truly enjoyed. But it was limited hence not completely loving it.

Janelle was hit by a truck (which appeared out of thin air) and she died. But she was brought back to life by her schoolmate, Ben Michaels. And I was wondering how he did that? So you see I was eager to know how he did it (even asking for spoilers). How he brought Janelle back to life. And when he ‘vaguely’ answered her I’m still ended up like the proverbial deer in the headlights. Yes, I didn’t understand—at first. Maybe because chemistry is not my favorite subject (ok, I admit it’s my least favorite, I’m not big fan of atomic numbers) so when he started blabbing like he can manipulate physical matter, sensing molecular bonds I was ‘ok, this is so sci-fi in the most literal sense of the genre.’ Not only that, Ben and his friends, Elijah and Reid are from an alternate universe (I mentioned already the parallel universe). Frankly I don’t get the countdown at first. I was confused what it means. I initially though it has something to do with her father then I found about collision or something (forgot the term) and what it means. And it all boils down to one massive result—end of the world. The impending collision and how Ben and his friends got into Janelle’s universe came to me as trite. I wasn’t surprised thus it didn’t have that much impact on me. But it was nice addition though, added some twist (expected twist).

Janelle and the rest of the characters were acting like inconceivably adults. Instead of making them strong characters, it just made them more immature to me. Alex was my favorite but too bad he ended up *spoiler* dead *spoiler* But I don’t detest them; I kind of liked them actually. But they were hardly memorable to me.

And I gotta say, I really liked the ending and even though I’m huge fan of HEA (romance-wise) I’m glad the author ended it this way. It was an unexpected way to end it.

The overwhelming and rutted ideas were the reason why it throws me off. But it’s not a bad thing really. Some people may find it really interesting/refreshing.  As for me, it was too much in there that felt to me it was trying so hard to look like it was sci-fi book. When in fact it really is a sci-fi book so I don’t see the reason why it has to put a lot of that aspect in there. No need to prove anything. Probably would like it if the ideas put in here were more seamless.

**not sure if this is a series