Blood Red Road by Moira Young

Release Date: 2nd June, 2011

Publisher: Scholastic

Pages: 492pgs

The Story

In a lawless future land, where life is cheap and survival is hard, Saba has been brought up in isolated Silverlake. She never sees the dangers of the destructive society outside. When her twin brother is snatched by mysterious black-robed riders, she sets out on an epic quest to rescue him. The story's searing pace, its spare style, the excitement of its fabulously damaged world, its unforgettably vivid characters, its violent action and glorious lovestory make this a truly sensational YA debut novel.

The Review

Damn. Hot damn. There's so many things I want to say but it's incredibly hard to put down into words alone. For Moira Young's debut novel, BLOOD RED ROAD, it has been on my "to-read" list for quite some time now since its release day. One, because it had an interesting premise, and two, because I have a profound love of dystopian YA fiction. But with love comes expectations.

I tend to always worry when it comes to readers loving a particular book title and then having them recommending it to you with plenty of gushing comments being thrown your way. It kind of sets an assortment of high expectations for you - to a person who has yet to read the book. So will the book that all my friends and fellow bloggers loved turn out to be one of those books that I couldn't love or even like? I would love to say no but unfortunately for everyone who recommended this book to me . . . I just didn't like it and there wasn't that strong connection that I have with many other book titles similar to this one.

One of the main problems with book marketing is when they compare a certain book title to other popular books and in this case BLOOD RED ROAD was compared to the likes of the Hunger Games. Being a hardcore fan of Hunger Games, if publishers market it to that series I would then have to think it must be good. But of course it's a shame since nothing will compare to the Hunger Games! As our narrator, I did - at times - come to love the main character, Saba, because she was a total kickass gal. She didn't know what she was capable of until you hit the middle parts of the book, but I did admire her qualities in terms of survival. But as for the storyline itself and the way it was written, it was just . . . *does that awkward Kristen Stewart face* . . . not very good at all.

Illiterate people may understand the prose of this novel - I know that's terrible - because it was written in a very harsh format. It was unique - that's for sure - but with no quotations in any parts of the dialogue and with the english word murdered in cold blood, the book through my eyes just didn't work for its potential. The only time I enjoyed myself was when I was reading out loud to my parents and impersonating the Southern accent . . . which, like I said, was very enjoyable and hilarious to my parents at least. But other than that, the prose made the main character even more uneducated then she already was and it made me think something was wrong with me personally. Plus it didn't help when the book messed up my own high vocbalary and I don't like that one bit of 'messing around' with it.

While readers will enjoy the adventure aspects of BLOOD RED ROAD and while I would still recommend it to people who love the itty-gritty action-esque scenes, unfortunately it just wasn't for me to enjoy. This book disappointed me in all levels. Despite it being written in a girl's point of view I can definitely see guy readers liking this storyline more than the girls would. But overall I thought BLOOD RED ROAD was a fun once-read and I'm looking forward to what else Moira Young writes despite what I may think of this book. Damn and I really wanted to love this book. Sighs. Anyway two thumbs up for the cover!

The Rating

2/5 stars