The Dark Intercept by Julia Keller | How dangerous your emotions can be?

There were a few books this year that I picked up because of their amazing-sounding Blurb.  New Earth and Old Earth, Sci-fi and Dystopian, this new perfect life where noone can ever harm you, where there are no crimes, no illnesses, no hunger. Unfortunately, it didn’t live up to my expectations.

This keeps happening to me over and over again, and I’m starting to doubt my ability to choose good books for myself. Maybe I’m being particularly picky or maybe I am making poor choices. Or the blurbs tend to lie more often than not!

The State controls your emotions. What would you pay to feel free?

In a radiant world of endless summer, the Intercept keeps the peace. Violet Crowley, the sixteen-year-old daughter of New Earth’s Founding Father, has spent her life in comfort and safety. Her days are easy thanks to the Intercept, a crime-prevention device that monitors and provokes emotion. But when her long-time crush, Danny Mayhew, gets into a dangerous altercation on Old Earth, Violet launches a secret investigation to find out what he’s hiding. An investigation that will lead her to question everything she’s ever known about Danny, her father, and the power of the Intercept.

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The feelings this book left in my mind reminds me of another Sci-fi / Fantasy book I read earlier this year – «The Evaporation of Sofi Snow» by Mary Weber. Just like Mary Weber’s book, this one had a GREAT, INNOVATIVE AND INTERESTING CONCEPT. But the execution was not the best.

There wasn’t a single character that I liked or deserved any sort of sympathy from me. Violet seemed unbelievably shallow, her father only had one trait – “make the world a better place no matter what”, and the rest of the characters weren’t developed enough for me to form any sort of opinion on them.

Violet constantly talked about her love interest, throughout the whole book and then NOTHING HAPPENED, the relationship didn’t go anywhere. If you read this book, you might disagree and say: Hey, some major events unraveled by the end of the book and Violet had her moment with Danny. And that is true, but it felt weird, considering the circumstances.

The concept was poorly executed, in my opinion, and deserved a little bit more depth and details. The characters deserved to have other conversations than “What is Danny up to”.

I liked the idea of the New Earth and the control over people’s emotions to prevent any crime, no matter how small it might be. I loved the idea of the Rebellion and a group of people fighting against the government, fighting to keep their emotions to themselves. And I wish it would have been written better, would have focused more on a core rather than someone’s love interest.

My Rating:

★☆☆☆☆

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge for the ARC of this book. Feeling slightly disappointed because I really thought I’d like it, considering my love to this genre.

Have you read this book? Were you interested in picking it up?

What was the last book you felt disappointed about?

Let me know in the comments below!

With love, Alex

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