This story is insane because the world is pretty much nuts from the get-go. Even just outside of the fact that these kids are being hunted and malnourished, they are also completely unsupervised and somehow are still having classes and learning things which made little sense to me. Strangely, I still found the atmosphere the most interesting part of it even though I didn't find it very realistic.

Characterization-wise, I wasn't blown away. The main character was typical broody and the 'love interest' was aloof sunshine boy who doesn't really get any sort of interesting until the second book. Still, the chaotic nature of it kept me reading on to part two.