Character - 6
Atmosphere - 6
Writing - 7
Plot - 5
Intrigue - 5
Logic - 6
Enjoyment - 5

Rating: 5.71 / 3 stars

Character - 7
Atmosphere - 7
Writing - 8
Plot - 9
Intrigue - 9
Logic - 7
Enjoyment - 8

Rating: 7.86 / 4 stars

Character - 10
Atmosphere - 9
Writing - 9
Plot - 8
Intrigue - 9
Logic - 8
Enjoyment - 10

Rating: 9.00 / 5 stars

I am absolutely obsessed with this book. I honestly requested it solely because I kept seeing all these neon pictures on my feed and I was intrigued by the cover, but it ended up being an incredible read that I marathoned in one sitting. I listened to the audiobook, but I definitely want to get a physical copy for a reread soon.

I will absolutely be reading more from Kate Dylan in the future, the writing was so readable and accessible that I sat down to listen to ‘a chapter or two’ and then I blinked and I’d read the whole thing. It had the kind of cinematic feel that I love in YA, and it worked so well for the sci-fi/thriller genre. This would make a spectacular movie, and I need it immediately in front of my eyeballs. The premise itself also felt very cinematic. It was creative, pulling in some fascinating ideas from across sci-fi and combining them in a way that felt very unique. The world-building was straightforward and easy to understand without overloading the story at the front. I’m a big fan of a book dropping us into its high concept and explaining as we go, and MINDWALKER absolutely nailed that in the first few chapters.

The futuristic elements were really well handled too. I read a *lot* of sci-fi, and a lot of Star Wars novels, and I love them a lot but I’m well aware that futuristic elements in a book can end up being…. a bit silly. That didn’t happen in MINDWALKER, I was totally immersed and committed from the first page to the last and I felt utterly convinced the whole way through that this could really happen. I don’t think I’ve read many books that had sci-fi settings but thriller pacing, but I know I want more. It worked so well, keeping me on the edge of my seat until the very end.

I loved the characters, and - and this is rare for me in a YA novel - I loved the romance. The romance in this book really hinged on the fact that our main character and her love interest came from completely opposite sides of the conflict with completely opposite beliefs. I’m very used to YA books having their main character always quietly opposing the system, but Sil is fully entrenched at the start of the book. This was so much more interesting to me, as Sil had to learn to challenge her beliefs and acknowledge her privilege as she was taken completely out of the world she was used to. It made me absolutely adore Sil as a character, and added so much depth to her relationships with the Analog Army.

Character - 4
Atmosphere - 8
Writing - 8
Plot - 5
Intrigue - 6
Logic - 5
Enjoyment - 6

Rating: 6.00 / 3 stars

Okay. Okay, I didn’t love this book. At a push I’m not entirely sure whether I liked this book or not. It really says something that I came back to review this and I couldn’t remember a thing about what happened. It’s a good thing I’d written out notes after finishing it, or I don’t think I’d have had much to say here. It just wasn’t memorable enough for me to have any strong feelings about this book.

The writing was beautiful, but I didn’t like either of our main characters. As a character-driven reader, this just didn’t work for me. Luca was a complex character with lots of layers, but honestly? I found her kind of boring. She was complex but we didn’t get the depth in her that I would have needed to pull me through this story. I hated her attitude towards Naomi. Like, actually hated it. Naomi was a completely flat character, but she still didn’t deserve how Luca treated her. My favourite character in this book was Whitney, and the relationship between Luca and Whitney. Which obviously didn’t last long, with Whitney’s death being mentioned in the synopsis.

This book is sold as a murder-mystery/thriller. I’m not convinced on this. I think that it felt primarily like a contemporary, with a splash of mystery and thriller throughout. This didn’t help my enjoyment, as I don’t like YA contemporaries to start with. There’s very little ‘investigation’ in this for a mystery, and the mystery didn’t really impact anything. It had the character study feeling of a contemporary instead. For a mystery, I’d want more twists, and for a thriller more darkness or tension. This book was too much of a middle ground to work for me. The ending was unsatisfying, and I wanted more of a conclusion. We got enough information to kind of understand what the curse is, but I wanted to know more about what happened to Polly.

I did like that the book talked about the different forms that privilege can take, and how Luca acknowledged that while marginalised in some ways (plus-sized qpoc) she still had the privilege of her family’s money, but I honestly wish this whole book had been a novella focused on this aspect of the story rather than the ‘mystery’ we got.

Character - 9
Atmosphere - 7
Writing - 8
Plot - 9
Intrigue - 9
Logic - 8
Enjoyment - 9

Rating: 8.43 / 4 stars

Character - 7
Atmosphere - 6
Writing - 5
Plot - 6
Intrigue - 4
Logic - 5
Enjoyment - 6

Rating: 5.57 / 3 stars

Perfect 10/10. I said what I said.

Character - 8
Atmosphere - 7
Writing - 7
Plot - 9
Intrigue - 8
Logic - 8
Enjoyment - 9

Rating: 8.00 / 4 stars

C - 8
A - 9
W - 7
P - 6
I - 6
L - 5
E - 7

Rating: 6.86 / 3 stars

Character - 8
Atmosphere - 9
Writing - 8
Plot - 9
Intrigue - 8
Logic - 6
Enjoyment - 9

Rating: 8.14 / stars