The Companions
The Companions
By: Katie M. Flynn
I was intrigued by this book-the cover, the supposed premise. But it only took a few pages to realize I wasn’t going to like it. They jumped right in without much backstory or description. I couldn’t picture the world she had created. There was terminology that wasn’t defined. It was confusing. I found the book’s summary to be deceiving. I thought it would be an adventure, suspense story of a person who was killed and became a droid/companion and sought revenge on the person who killed her and that there would be clues to follow and information we would learn where things didn’t happen the way she remembered them, etc. But really her story wasn’t even the majority of the book. It follows so many other characters that share a link but don’t serve any purpose for Lilac and her mission.
If the author’s main point in writing this story was to explore the perspectives of how people lived in this dystopian world over a long period of time, how their lives were affected, and how relationships worked- then don’t present it as a revenge/redemption story. And even if she had presented it accurately, I wouldn’t say she even excelled in the ‘drama’ genre. I don’t mind reading from a variety of perspectives- i.e. I think Big Little Lies does that well- but this was very jumpy, spanning too much time, a lot of vague inner processing of the characters, and it all seemed pretty meaningless.
I was constantly asking ‘Where is she going with this?’ and tried to speculate how she was going to bring it altogether but it never happened. It had so much potential that went untapped. The moments that she actually decided to resolve, happened in a short, undramatic, and anticlimactic way. Another common thought I had throughout- ‘Wait, that’s it?’ The last sentence of the whole book that was meant to be fulfilling and whole was weak and empty. I was just not impressed with the writing and execution. It was confusing, boring, and disappointing. Additionally, this book had a lot of sexual content I did not care for.
I wish she could start over and attempt this again. I think it could have been a better ‘I,robot meets ghost-in-the-shell’ type of book that I could have enjoyed. This fell far short.
** I received an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review **