I wasn’t exactly fooling myself into thinking this was going to be an amazing book after I ended up buying it for $2 on the discount shelf at my local used book store, especially after seeing it sit on the regular shelf at full price for about five months. But I thought, hey, I like the Atlantic myth, and I’ve been wrong about books before.To be fair, this isn’t a bad book. I’ve read pretty bad books in my lifetime, especially in the YA category, so I know my bad books. But this is book is, unfortunately, pretty boring. There might not be anything terrible in its contents, but neither is there anything awesome, and in a very saturated market, you have to stand out some how. The characters, unfortunately, just aren’t that interesting. Their personalities are like cardboard. I read over 200 pages into this book and still couldn’t get a handle on who these characters were. Owen … likes to swim? Care about his dad? That’s about all I know. Lilly wants to act like she’s so upset that her parents sacrificed everything to give her a better life? So her character is ungrateful on top of being annoying? I don’t know how to properly express how frustrating it is that after 200 pages I still didn’t know the characters, and there was absolutely no character development. Ignore the plot, the characters are the problem with this book.I was, however, interested in learning about what had happened to the earth. I thought learning about the domes and the planet’s condition was the most interesting part of the book, which is kind of sad now that I think about it, because the author does his best to gloss over anything that might be scientifically questionable. So I didn’t even get to Atlantis. At over halfway through the book, I didn’t get to what the actual plot was, I had no character development, and I ended up being more interested in checking my comment responses on reddit. This is how I know a book is going to be a DNF. When reddit takes priority, all the signs are there. If this book worked of other people, then I’m really happy for them, genuinely happy, but for me it was something I couldn’t even finish. With lackluster characters, mediocre writing, and a generic feel to the book, it absolutely would have been a complete pass, if I hadn’t gotten it for $2. I found myself really wanting to not finish this book. With each chapter it just became more and more unbelievable. I really like how the book started with dome environments and stuff, but then Emmerson introduced too many ideas and attempted to weave them together. For me, this book would have been more successful if Emmerson had stuck to one or two of the many ideas he had going. Connecting Vikings, Myans, etc with Atlantians through the use of crystal skulls was just too much. Like the fourth Indian Jones, hypothesizing what the "mystic" skulls are makes the premise of the book/movie thin and unbelievable. I lost interest.
What do You think about Le Code Perdu (2014)?
While I typically love these types of books, this one just seemed awkward. Easy read though.
—Maia
Didn't finish. I just couldn't get into the storyline.
—claudiaballs_
