Book Review: Eve and Adam by Michael Grant and Katherine Applegate

Goodreads summary:

And girl created boy…

In the beginning, there was an apple—

And then there was a car crash, a horrible injury, and a hospital. But before Evening Spiker’s head clears a strange boy named Solo is rushing her to her mother’s research facility. There, under the best care available, Eve is left alone to heal.

Just when Eve thinks she will die—not from her injuries, but from boredom—her mother gives her a special project: Create the perfect boy.

Using an amazingly detailed simulation, Eve starts building a boy from the ground up. Eve is creating Adam. And he will be just perfect... won’t he?

My review:

I wanted to like this so badly, but I didn't care for it much.  I had high hopes for this since Michael Grant helped write it, and I'm obsessed with his amazing Gone series.  But while the Gone series has strong characters and complex, tension-filled plots, Eve and Adam has rather boring, stereotypical characters and not much of a plot to speak of.

One thing I did like is how it's such a fast read.  I was flipping the pages pretty quickly, and it never got too painfully boring to read.  It just didn't grab my attention.  Also, I don't get why the title is Eve and Adam.  I kept waiting for Adam to make his appearance, but he's actually not in the story much.

I didn't feel any emotional attachment to the characters.  Eve isn't an interesting heroine, and I found her to be boring.  Her mom, who's kind of the villain of the story, was really aggravating.  Everyone kept talking about how terrible and heartless she was, which is part of the problem.  There was too much "telling" going on and not enough "showing."

Then there's the subplot with Eve's best frend Aislinn.  I didn't care for Aislinn at all - she was probably the most cliched character in the story.  She's very girly and always flirting, and I couldn't stand it.  Also, what was with the plot anyway?  Hardly anything happened besides Eve hanging out in the hospital, and then there's the random subplot with Aislinn's boyfriend getting into trouble and Eve having to go help out.  It totally didn't fit into the story at all.

I know this is supposed to be a light, fun read - not a mindblowing type of book like the Gone books.  But still, I didn't find it to be very fun.  I laughed maybe two or three times, but none of the funny lines were as funny as they should've been.  There are other people who have enjoyed this book, but it's just not for me.

My rating:  4 out of 10 (2 stars)

~ The Bookworm