Dystopian power fantasy with bugs. The bugs are the best part - creepy disease bearing ticks that bite and breed inside flesh, that carry an enormous risk of fatality. They're genuinely creepy and gross, and every time they come centre stage the book picks right up. Less successful, for me, were the characters. Nearly all of whom were unpleasant, and at least one of whom - Wes - seems to me to be shot in quirky soft focus, almost. (It's very clear who the favourite character was!) Now unpleasant characters can be successful and entertaining, but you've got to commit to the unpleasantness - not make irredeemable villains, but not gloss anything over either, and there's a bit too much gloss here undermining what is fundamentally a story of the bad places entitlement can take you.

In short: interesting premise, adequately executed, but there was a sharp-edged story waiting to be told hidden in there I think.