Review of Mystic City

Synopsis - From Goodreads

For fans of Matched, The Hunger Games, X-Men, and Blade Runner comes a tale of a magical city divided, a political rebellion ignited, and a love that was meant to last forever. Book One of the Mystic City Novels.

Aria Rose, youngest scion of one of Mystic City's two ruling rival families, finds herself betrothed to Thomas Foster, the son of her parents' sworn enemies. The union of the two will end the generations-long political feud—and unite all those living in the Aeries, the privileged upper reaches of the city, against the banished mystics who dwell below in the Depths. But Aria doesn't remember falling in love with Thomas; in fact, she wakes one day with huge gaps in her memory. And she can't conceive why her parents would have agreed to unite with the Fosters in the first place. Only when Aria meets Hunter, a gorgeous rebel mystic from the Depths, does she start to have glimmers of recollection—and to understand that he holds the key to unlocking her past. The choices she makes can save or doom the city—including herself.

Review

From the moment I first saw the cover and read the blurb to this book I just knew that I had to read it. The idea behind the book is brilliant and the synopsis compares it to two of my favourite dystopian books. Unfortunately it didn’t quite live up to my expectations. Whilst the storyline was as incredible as I thought it would be, one element was lacking for me and that was the characters.

Aria is the perfect example of the type of character I dislike; whiney, gullible and without the tiniest shred of intelligence. Without hardly any questioning she just believes anything she is told even when things don’t make sense, she needs people to fully explain every little detail to her to know what is going on. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the book is very predictable and it is clear to everyone (except Aria) what is going on from the very start of the book. Aria did grow slightly as a character towards the end so I hope that she is less innocent and naive in future books.

All other aspects of the book were excellent. I loved the dystopian world that is the setting to this star crossed love story; two wildly different social classes, a flooded future Manhattan and people with powers that despite being necessary to the city functioning are hated and feared by the rich. I also liked the political and rebellion aspects to this book.

One of the best things about this book was Hunter. He was mysterious, strong, romantic and everything else that makes a perfect love interest. I loved Hunter and Aria’s relationship, he definitely brought out the best aspects of her character.

Despite me having some dislikes I do think that overall this is a good book. If Aria had been more developed as a character this could have become one of my favourites so I have high hopes for the second book. I also want to find out more about the Mystics as they were one of the best parts of this book and I think there is so much more to discover about them.