Format: E-Galley, 320 pages
Release Date: August 27, 2019
Publisher: Swoon Reads
Source: Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Science Fiction
A teen programmer at a school for geniuses must join forces with a boy she can't remember to stop a hacker from deleting their memories in this YA debut.
Arden sells memories. Whether it’s becoming homecoming queen or studying for that all important test, Arden can hack into a classmate’s memories and upload the experience for you just as if you’d lived it yourself. Business is great, right up until the day Arden whites out, losing fifteen minutes of her life and all her memories of the boy across the school yard. The boy her friends assure her she’s had a crush on for years.
Arden realizes that her own memories have been hacked, but they haven’t just been stolen and shared… they’ve been removed. And she’s not the only one: her mysterious crush, Sebastian, has lost ALL of his memories. But how can they find someone who has the power to make them forget everything they’ve learned?
Mind Games is author Shana Silver's debut novel. Mind Games is a science fiction and mystery novel, narrating the life of
Arden Varga who is a computer genius and a skilled hacker. Arden's father developed a cloud-based memory uploading app. Every memory gets backed up and synced to the brain instantly. Arden attends an invitation only High School which is sponsored by her mothers company; Vargas Industries. Arden sells memories and
experiences to her classmates for their benefit by using Hivemind.
She soon realizes that her
a bunch of her memories have been deleted from her mind, including that of Sebastian Cuomo who she should know, but has no memories of and neither does he. Arden and Sebastian
Cuomo eventually discover that this whole mind wipe centers around
around their final project – something that was apparently
life-changing, and something that the hacker doesn’t want to see
completed. To make matters worse, those around her, including teachers, seem to be having the same issues with loss of memories.
Silver puts together a plot
that is fast-paced and disturbing, containing plenty of suspense, and
twists at the end, to keep readers invested. Arden's thoughts feel real
and natural, which positively contributes to the story. I
liked the portions where the author shows Arden's brilliance where she ends up retrieving and putting the trail together piece by piece as the memories
played out in reverse. Arden is a curious character who wears high heels everywhere. I honestly thought that was unrealistic. How many 17-18-years old wear kitten heals to high school?
Sebastian was somewhat interesting, essentially building himself up from a blank slate due to his complete memory loss. The romance was subtle and not in your face. The plot itself was really well built. I wasn’t able to predict who Arden's antagonists were until the very end, even though there were hints of who they were, and even then I was so shell shocked that I
started to doubt everything around me.
books like these are hit and miss with me. it's all about if the characters can engage me
ReplyDeletesherry @ fundinmental