Well, this was interesting. The writing style had me hook... at first. After that, it was too much. I could tell that the author has clearly studied prose, but this was just hard to read. The repetition repetition repetition every 1 2 7 sentences was really hard to read. It required a special midset that took a while to fall into. I have no natural rhythm. Poetry, songs, and this prose are the bane of my existence. Also why all the numbers. Seriously, is it too hard to spell out one? I know she can do it because the 2 times someone used a number while talking it was spelled out. It really got on my nerves and brought me out of the story.

Lastly, I really just was not a fan of Juliette for a while. There was a lot about this book that was just really, really annoying. Like it took me well over 150 pages to understand the whole dislike for Warner. I mean sure, he wanted to use her as a tool but other than "he's evil!!!!!!! EVIL I TELL YOU!!!!!!" he just seemed like a product of his environment, more of an anti-hero than a villain. Or just the antagonist, but not villainous. It was because she was against him before they even met. And for some reason, I thought she was brought to the rebels first so I was really confused. Her reactions just seemed too preemptive. There was no discovery that she was working with the bad guys.

And the pacing seemed really off as well. Nothing interesting happened for the first 200-ish pages other than Juliette getting out of the asylum.

And the last chapter does no9t automatically mean it's an epilogue just because it's the last chapter in a book. Just like chapter 1 doesn't auto equal prologue. The "epilogue" in this book is literally just the next chapter, taking place three seconds after the previous chapter, still in the same room with the same characters and setting up the next book. That's not an epilogue. It's the final chapter.

Oddly enough though I was engrossed enough (probably because the world, which there was not of) was interesting. I think every time the plot or Juliette started to seem dumb and pointless they were just like 'hey there, flash black to cool interesting stuff. You like this book. You like it. There's political manipulation. You liiiiiiiike this boooooook." Well, that got annoying, and I didn't.