November Rain Review

I’M GETTING BACK IN THE GROOVE! *Funky music playing*

 

Seventeen-year-old Serena isn’t human. She is a bad blood, and in the city of Vendona, bad bloods are executed. In the last moments before she faces imminent death, a prison guard aids her escape and sparks a revolt. Back on the streets determined to destroy her kind, Serena is spared by a fellow bad blood named Daniel. His past tragedies are as equally mysterious as her connection to them.

Unbeknownst to the two, this connection is the key to winning the election for bad bloods’ rights to be seen as human again. But Serena is the only one who can secure Vendona’s vote. Now, Daniel must unite with her before all hope is lost and bad bloods are eradicated, even if it means exposing secrets worse than death itself. United or not, a city will fight, rain will fall, and all will be threatened by star-crossed love and political corruption. –goodreads.com summary

“’Goodbye then’

Daniel’s emerald eyes trailed back up to me. ‘I don’t say goodbye unless I think it’s final.’”

I want to begin by saying thank you to Shannon for giving me a copy of this amazing book and being so awesome! With that said, November Rain was an AMZAZING book that all of you should check out as soon as it comes out! It was full of strong characters each with their own background and an interesting world.

One thing to know about November Rain is that it is a character driven novel! This might turn off a few people but don’t be nervous, it is a good thing. The novel is made of an ensemble cast of characters with two main leads and Shannon Thompson finds a way to give background and meaning to all of these characters. There are entire scenes devoted to simply showing how these characters interact with each other and how they are like a family. These scenes were probably some of my favorite in the entire book because they remind the reader that, even though these characters are in this SCIFI/ dystopian future, they are still kids and do still act like it. It was a great chance for Thompson to humanize the characters and make them more relatable, and she took it.

The world of Bad Bloods is very intriguing and I can’t wait to read more about it! Like every good dystopian world, I want to know everything about it. I want to know how the world got like this, what is going to happen to this world, what are the politics like in this world— I’m invested. Thompson went a little into politics in November Rain but I hope that we get more information about the political system in the next book. I would also love to see more people outside the flock, since not all adults are evil; it could give insight into how the rest of the world thinks.

My one downside with November Rain is with the conflict. The conflict is very personal and not as large scale as one would expect. It reminds me a lot of The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer how November Rain is more a struggle between characters than a struggle with a looming antagonist. This is good because characters have a chance to be developed but also bad because it feels like build up to a bigger conflict to happen at a later time. But this feeds into the fact that it is more of a character based novel that a plot driven novel. There are mentions of outside threats, but the book mostly leaves those to be explored in the second book, and I am excited to see where it goes.

Overall, I am very glad I read November Rain! It is a great novel for anyone looking for a more character centered and grounded SCIFI story. It is a quick read, so prefect for anyone looking for something to get them out of a reading slump. I recommend November Rain for EVERYONE but especially fans of dystopian and SCIFI.

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Elise!