The Book NymphBook Review for ‘Intact’3.5/5.0
‘Unfortunately what was right and
fair, mattered not at all to life.’
Intact is a futuristic story in
which humans are clashing with droids/A.I.’s/robots, etc. From the very first
chapter, you can feel the steam and lust and it is wonderful! The book starts
off with a young married couple, Alexia & Miles, coming to realize they’re
expecting a child in a world that is nearly at war. Alexia is 100% human, while
Miles is more computer than not. As the storyline continues, not one but two
more couples & their love stories take center stage. Both have uniquely
different issues, yet are very similar. One is unsure how the other feels,
causing an overload of insecurities, doubts and heart ache. Dex is head over
heels in love with Rep, a nearly perfect specimen who is also his best friend.
However, unable to read Rep in anyway, Dex often bites hit tongue to the point
of drawing blood, to avoid getting hurt. Not only is he afraid of making a fool
of himself, he’s afraid of losing Rep all together. Until of course he reaches
his breaking point, and only when he’s ready to walk out the door & leave
everyone behind, including the love of his life, does Rep then make his feeling
known. He is also in love with Dex & always has been. Because of what Rep
is, he can block out how he feels from the intelligence that surrounds (they can
read all but your thoughts by checking & scanning your vitals, hormone
levels, etc.) The second couple, who literally met while one was kidnapping the
other, is Sim & Kiston. Before Sim kidnapped Kiston off of the street, he
had been watching her closely under surveillance for months. Maybe that’s why
he thought it was okay for him to snatch her off the street & tie her up to
a chair. Kiston is a doctor who is extremely passionate about equal rights for
bots/droids/A.I. for deeply personal reasons. She is also the key to figuring
out who is behind viscous attacks on humans & droids alike, making her
extremely important to Miles & his gang of misfits. She also has valid
reasons to believe that the bots are not only real, but have feelings, just as
humans do. Sim completely disagrees and feels since he’s closer to being a
machine, his opinion takes precedence. But of course, the two butt heads, drive
each other completely mad, leading them to fall insanely in love. At the end
you put all the pieces together & solve a mystery you thought had already
been solved.
Within the first few chapters,
you get an overwhelming feeling that you’re missing something. Which, you are.
Being that ‘Intact’ is a sequel, you’re missing an entire book. A challenging
part of writing a sequel, is finding the balance between giving enough of a
summary of what happened in the first book to catch readers up, but not overdoing
it. You want new readers to be able to pick up the second book and have an idea
of what happened previously in the story, but you don’t want to bore past readers,
who already know. The author did little to no summation of the previous story, making it difficult to continue reading at times. You completely miss
out on the background of Miles & Alexia’s love story, you don’t who most of
the characters are, but most importantly the world building is missing. The
idea of the story is fantastic, but unless you’ve read the first book, you’re
more than likely to get lost easily and quickly. The love stories, of all of
the couples are enjoyable to read. However, there could have been more build up
for the main love story of Sim & Kiston. While in most of the book the two
were playing cat & mouse, the relationship picked up too quickly. Yes, they
mostly isolated, spending a lot of time around each other, but the quickness in
which she gets over being kidnapped off the street, tied to a chair for a
couple of hours (by not just him, but all of them) was a bit unrealistic. It
would have taken more time to adjust to the situation. Her comfort with Sim
felt a little rushed. Although I missed out on a lot of big details from the
first book, the technology and world that the author created was very smart
& intriguing. The end brought a final twist, accompanied with a small
heartache, you wouldn’t expect.
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