I Am the Storm

 

#notsponsored.

This book was a digital copy from NetGalley.

I am an affiliate with Z Publishing House. See link at the end of this post.

I Am the Storm is written by Tash McAdam and published by Nine Star Press in 2018. This is a dystopian science fiction story aimed at young adults, though middle schoolers would also likely enjoy it. I was given a digital copy through Net Galley. This review is my opinion.

I Am the Storm is set in a dystopian world where ten percent of the population has telepathic abilities. The government—called the Institute—uses these individuals by brainwashing or forcing them into using their powers for the betterment of the government. A rebel group—called the ARC-- uses these abilities against the Institute. This book follows two telepathic kids, Sam, who is fourteen and is the only known techno-path, meaning he can control electronics, and Serena, who is a telepath training in the ARC. When Sam goes for a doctor’s appointment, he is abducted by the Institute and must try to escape from their brainwashing facility. Serena passes her final test and is assigned to rescuing whoever the Institute is trying desperately to capture along with her best friend turned enemy, Abial. The rest of the book follows these two story lines in alternating chapters until the two meet and have to escape the city.

After reading the description, I was really excited to read this book. The world sounded interesting, the characters fun, and the telepathic powers were a good twist on another dystopian tale. However, I found the execution . . . poorly done. Maybe I was expecting too much and should have lowered my expectations to a more middle-grade level book, but I feel that that is also unfair. 

The world building is too heavy handed, including an entire chapter where Serena is sitting in her room and telling the readers all about her life and the ARC and what the world is like from her perspective. An entire chapter! Sam does something similar, though at least he’s actively using his powers to entertain himself while waiting for his appointment—which in my opinion, is the reason he gets caught making everything his fault—but it’s too much and not well done. I nearly stopped on page 35 but kept going only because the book is only 175 pages long. Despite all this telling, there are several things that I am confused about. One, why is the City so drastically separated between the poor and the rich? What caused this and why is it so enforced—the poor aren’t given medical aid or education—when there doesn’t seem to be a reason for this? Maybe if the themes were supposed to focus on socio-economic inequality this would work, but that’s not really a theme that is prevalent or expanded on in this book. Second, why on earth is “Google” used as a swear word? What world or time period are we supposed to be in that this particular word’s meaning has changed from mega-corporation used to find things on the internet to a swear word? “Nuke” I assume would refer to a nuclear war which may have led to this society and would make a little more sense, but “Google” . . . I have trouble with that one.

I also have to admit I really didn’t care about Serena and Abial’s story arc. I was happy that McAdams doesn’t make Serena the love interest for Sam. She has a crush on Abial but their friendship is strained since Serena hasn’t said anything about it and Abial is now actively trying to sabotage their friendship. At first, I thought Serena was right in guessing Abial was either homophobic or maybe she was just angry that Serena hasn’t fessed up to it yet, but later we learn it’s because she’s jealous of how much attention Serena is getting from their trainer, Kion. Abial cheats and actively tries to stop Serena from passing her training by telepathically projecting an image of Serena’s dead baby brother into the arena . . . because she’s jealous. I was pissed. And on top of all that, Kion payed attention to Serena because they’re related—which I hadn’t realized either which seems odd since we’re in Serena’s head and not Abial’s. First, I call bullshit. I think that bit about being related to Kion was just thrown in at the end as an excuse. Second, it made me not care about Abial at all. I don’t care if you are jealous; you do not make your “friend” see their dead baby brother. Period. Nothing is really resolved through their actions on the mission and I don’t feel bad for them when Abial is killed. Also, I call bullshit x2 with that. Why is the death of the romantic interest such a common thing in lgbtq+ literature? It annoys me so much!

I do like Sam’s story line. His escape and how he plans his revenge is cool. I did wish the plot line with his father and the reader—a telepath who is can trace someone’s path by “reading” what they’ve touched—had been developed a bit more. It would’ve created some more internal conflict for Sam, given more insight into the world, and given more elements that could create more trouble for the characters in general. But it’s mentioned, used as an excuse for how Sam can escape, and then never mentioned again. 

Finally, the ending was a bit disappointing. Serena and Sam escape the city into the desert, they are being chased and have no way of escape, Sam manages to get rid of the guards, and they are left to drive into the unknown with reinforcements on their tail. If they had even just made it to the ARC base or both been captured, something a little more final than “runaway round two,” maybe I would have accepted it. But this ending doesn’t feel like an ending. It just stops.

Overall, I was disappointed. I love the concept and Sam is cool, but there is too much exposition, plot lines aren’t developed or at least not developed well, and I did not care about Serena’s story or her relationship with Abial. I wanted to like this book but it just fell on its face for me. I was reminded a bit of the Alex Rider books so maybe this would be appealing to that demographic or maybe middle schoolers in general, but I felt the end result wasn’t worth the time and effort and I feel bad about that because I wanted to like this book. Apparently there is another book, so maybe I need to read that one in order to understand this one better, but right now, I can’t bring myself to do it. 

Thank you NetGalley for an early copy of I Am the Storm.

I am an affiliate with Z Publishing House. I get a small commission from anything purchased through this link: http://www.zpublishinghouse.com?rfsn=1831564.e6264