Pages: 204
Published: July 26th 2013
Series: N/A – Stand Alone
Source: Author for review
They took everything: her family, her home, her childhood.By the age of nineteen, Raven has spent most of her life in the sprawling slums of America, fighting as a rebel against the dictatorship. When the rebellion steals an experimental time-travel device, she travels back five decades to the year 2013. Her plan: assassinate the future dictator when he is still young and vulnerable, long before he comes to power. She must move fast to reshape history, because agents from her own time are on her trail, ready to execute her on sight.
When J.L. Bryan contacted me to review his new novel, to put it mildly, I was ELATED! Jenny Pox was actually the first e-book I ever read and I absolutely adored it, and the following book, Tommy Nightmare. The synopsis sounded so interesting; I’m becoming more and more interested in Science Fiction and the time travel element me intrigued immediately. I’ve only read a handle of books about time travel but every one I have thoroughly enjoyed. Needless to say, Nomad did not disappoint me.
Immediately you are thrust into action with the first chapter. Raven “wakes up” on a highway, nearly getting killed by a truck, with absolutely no memory of how she got there. She is covered in blood and wearing completely different clothes from the people around her. She soon realizes she is on a race for her life and to save the future as she knows it.
Raven was freaking AMAZING. Ohemgee, she was tough, smart and incredibly loyal to her loved ones. I adored her immediately. There is not a single fault I could find in her, she was perfect in my opinion. Her strength and toughness is so rare in female main characters and she did had both of those qualities nailed down. The character building was great in Nomad. Even the characters that you only seen glimpses of, or only appeared every so often(Kari for instance) you felt such an attachment to them from Raven’s flashbacks(or are they flashforwards?? Time travel always trips me up!). Gosh, I even started to warm up to Lucas, the evil dictator!
The world building was intense. Future USA is bleak, at best, but has a crazy amount of advanced technology. Well, obviously, they can travel back in time now. The weapons, the visual devices, all of it was fascinating. The best part about it all was that it was entirely believable. The futuristic world is not something that is entirely non plausible so it was easy to imagine yourself there, fighting for your existence and freedom.
The plot and pacing was phenomenal. I clung to this book for the entire second half. In fact, I wouldn’t even pick it back up until I was certain I had the time to sit and read it through to the end. Everything starts to come together so quickly at the end that it’s impossible to put down. It’s extremely fast paced and there was times I was TERRIFIED for Raven(and the other characters), and it also broke my heart a few times as well. It’s hard to explain why without spoiling anything, but believe me, the emotional part of the story is just as incredible as the action. The time travel aspect was awesome. I can never fully wrap my head around the concept of it, it really mystified me, but I enjoy it very much. The whole idea that what you change in the past, will change the future and then where do you end up? It leaves my head aching but I LOVE it every time.
J.L Bryan did an amazing job of taking an existing genre(dystopian) and putting an entirely unique and enjoyable twist on it. OH! And the ENDING! Oh my gosh… And that’s all I will say. 😉 There isn’t a single negative thing I can say about this. I suggest you pick this up, especially if you love dystopian and science fiction, I guarantee you will not be disappointed.
J.L. Bryan has been kind enough to offer a giveaway for one ebook(epub/mobi) copy of Nomad!
1. Open internationally
2. Open to anyone 13 years or older; void where prohibted by law
3. Winner has 48 hours to reply to email, otherwise a new winner be chosen
4. Giveaway runs until August 20th, 11:59pm EST
About J.L. Bryan
J.L. Bryan studied English literature at the University of Georgia and at Oxford, with a focus on the English Renaissance and the Romantic period. He also studied screenwriting at UCLA. He enjoys remixing elements of paranormal, supernatural, fantasy, horror and science fiction into new kinds of stories. He lives in Atlanta with his wife, his son, and some dogs and cats.
To hear about future books by J.L. Bryan, sign up for his new release newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mizJH
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