This dystopian read from Laila Lalami is frightening in how easily it can be believed to be integrated into the near future. It's a modern 1984, where Big Brother is always watching and all of your actions are scored to determine your worth or threat to society. When Sara Hussein's score exceeds 500, she is taken into custody by TSA on her return flight from London and sent to a detention center.

Defined as "not a prison", but instead a "holding" location, there are many excuses for why it is not against Sara's rights to hold her without charging her with an actual crime. The parallels to profiling and detention of immigrants and others of ethnic backgrounds are plainly obvious. Current events only heightened my apprehension at the actions that were occurring in the narrative. The potential realism is very powerful in generating intrigue for the plot.

The writing is fantastic and there are many issues approached and handled throughout the narrative that make things feel absolutely plausible. The tension between guards and detainees feels real and the mind games for both the characters and the readers themselves are very skillfully crafted. There was a definite hook.

So why not a 5-star read? Well...while the concept is intriguing and the execution paints a good picture of the possible ways this approach could go drastically wrong for innocent individuals, there were issues with pacing and with character construction. The plot felt occasionally repetitive and the pacing sometimes dragged a bit, making it feel like I was stuck in a deja vu situation for chapters at a time. This does serve to reinforce some of the trapped and helpless feeling of the situation, but distracted me from the overall movement of the narrative.

As far as the characters go, somehow they just felt flat to me. There wasn't a lot of dimension to them and I really didn't form a deep attachment to their particular well-being. The situation was gripping, but the individual story didn't shine.

Lastly, if you know anything about me, endings are a very important part of my rating decision. They can make or break a book. In this case, there were both good and bad things. Good: there was some resolution of the situation and I definitely got the PTSD feeling of the situation. There was a good message there. Bad: it felt like the plot just dropped out. There wasn't a firm conclusion and everything was just left floating mid-action. I get the intent, but it was super frustrating as a reader.

Summary? Good read. Well worth the time. I can absolutely see merit in its nomination for literary awards. Not a perfect read and it did require a bit of patience, but excellent concept and really well considered by the author. She's an author I would read again.