Rating: 4 stars
Synopsis: London, in the not-so-distant future. Society has been divided into Pures and Crazies according to the results of a DNA test.
But seventeen-year-old Ana, whose father invented the Pure test, has uncovered a recording with dangerous evidence that the tests are fake. Ana has escaped her father and made it to the Enlightenment Project - a secluded protest group living on the outskirts of the City.
Back in the arms of Cole nothing is simple. Some in the Project believe her presence jeopardises their safety, others interpret her coming as part of their prophetic Writings. When the recording Ana stole goes viral, the Project comes under attack. Now Ana's father isn't the only one looking for her. She's come to the attention of Evelyn Knight, the Chairman of the Board - a powerful woman with a sinister plan. Ana must take greater risks than ever to unravel the truth and discover the secrets that lie beneath the Pure test. But unlike her father, the Chairman doesn't want her safely home. She wants Ana's spirit crushed, permanently. And she will destroy everyone Ana cares about to do it.
My Review: So I loved The Glimpse. Absolutely loved it and I couldn't wait to read the final instalment. I started reading The Fall in earnest and it was okay but it lacked some of the edge that The Glimpse had.
The Fall picks up right where The Glimpse left off and so we're immediately plunged back into the story world and the problems facing the characters. I really like this approach - no nonsense and direct. The author is trusting that you've read the previous book/books and know what's happened previously. Ana reaches the Enlightenment Project but, instead of being welcomed like she hoped might happen, she is met mainly by hostility. I like the fact that this hostility stayed there in the background in the scenes in the Project. It's happened before where authors set up the hostility against the protagonist and then, a chapter later, everyone is suddenly alright with them being there. After fighting for her place at the Project, Ana and Cole are reunited (YES!) and their love is as sweet as it was in the first book.
The age difference between the characters doesn't matter in this book because the work that Merle has put into the characters to make them believable is so good that you end up wanting them to be together no matter what (and, personally, Ana and Cole make a much better pairing than Ana and Jasper in my opinion). One of my favourite parts of this book, was finding out that Cole had taken up guard duty by the wall near Ana's old house; keeping an eye out for her. I'm a hopeless romantic and that small scene between Cole and Ana was just so romantic and it made me so happy!
I liked that Merle didn't just leave us wondering about the other characters though. Some people might find the jumping of POV's a little off putting and I can totally understand that but it was needed with this book. There were a lot of characters in The Glimpse that I wanted to find out about. Jasper for one - how was he doing after his ordeal? I think if you're going to change POV's then you have to be good at it and Claire Merle really is.
One character I didn't like was Evelyn Knight - the 'baddie' in this book. Supposedly behind the Pure/Crazy split I felt like this was the one character in the entire series that I couldn't connect to. Maybe if she'd been worked into the first book, this issue wouldn't have been as prominent but she just kind of dropped out of nowhere and confused me a little. I understand why she was there and why she was needed but I just didn't see her as the 'bad guy' and, she wasn't in the early portions of the book enough to make me care. Maybe that was the problem? To me, Merle incorporated her too late - we had a few early scenes with her in but we didn't get to see much of her until the end and by then, I was bored by her character and backstory and this was the only thing that let The Fall down for me.
The plot was well thought out, the relationships between Ana and Cole, Ana and Jasper, Ana and her father worked well - they were very distinctive and there wasn't a love triangle between Ana, Cole and Jasper which I liked. Most of the early portion of the book was great, as was the ending. I thought it was a good ending; it wrapped everything up nicely. It was just the part where Evelyn got really involved in the plot that I lost interest. I couldn't believe why she was doing what she was doing and she irritated me a little. So much so, I found myself skipping some pages to get to something 'interesting'.
Don't get me wrong, I would definitely recommend this duology - it's a great read with well thought out characters (for the most part) and an intriguing plot line. And I urge you to read The Fall because it IS a good conclusion - you just have to put up with Evelyn Knight for a little while - but once she's out of the way, I did enjoy this book and I can't fault Merle's writing. If you want a book series that's quite short and fresh and new, then I would definitely recommend you trying this series.
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