Alice Reeds: Review: Retribution by Amy Rachel Thompson

Retribution by Amy Rachel Thompson
Published: June 18th 2013
Number of pages: 280 (paperback)
Series: Yes, #1

   Regan Edison has just moved from California, to enter her first year at Georgia Liberty College, the place where jacked up Chevy trucks and hunting are a way of life. Regan hopes to start a new life for herself and she thinks that Georgia is just the place to do it. That is until she meets an unexpected stranger.
   Colter Hayes is a member of the Collectors, a group of wrongfully punished lost souls. Colter and the rest of his team, Finn, Kaiden and Devon, work for the Requiem Council who pass judgment on those souls that are neither tagged for Heaven nor Hell. The Council has charged the Collectors with finding the lost in exchange for a chance at redemption.
   When an ex-councilmember known to pass Retribution on lost souls sets his sights on Regan, the Requiem Council dispatches the Collectors to Georgia to work as protectors for Regan. The Collectors must fight to save Regan from a fate they know all too well, but can they work to earn back their chance at redemption or are their fates sealed forever?
   Who is meant for Heaven?
   Who is meant for Hell?

And who is just lost? (goodreads)

I received a free copy of Riot from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

“Never, ever, ever, invite strangers into your room; they will be psychotic serial killers. You know what? Scratch that. Never, ever, ever go to college, apparently that’s where dreams, and young girls, go to die. Or maybe that’s just me.” (Regan)

When I first read the synopsis of Retribution on NetGalley I was intrigued and knew I wanted to read it. I don’t know if it’s because of my expectations of this book or if other people feel the same way, but honestly I was kind of disappointed by it. Unfortunately.

I really didn’t like how ‘easily’ Regan accepted everything the guys told her, about the Collectors, the Exiles or Agro. She showed some resistance yet still accepted in relatively fast. Somehow that seemed very unrealistic and it somehow bugged me. And speaking of the whole business with the Soul business. I don’t know if I’m too stupid to understand it or what but I found it all very confusing and somewhat poorly and confusingly explained. At first I thought that it was done this way to underline how confused Regan was by it all, but even toward the end of the book I still didn’t quite get it, though the characters tried to explain it all a few times. Oh well, maybe that’s just me.

When it comes to the main characters, I liked Regan, at least most of the time, not always though. She seemed like an all right narrator and person, though she doesn’t belong to my favorites. Sometimes her train of thoughts just made me stop and ask myself, or rather the book, “are you serious right now?” because she just made weird decision sometimes and would jump over into being stubborn and reckless for no reason whatsoever.

Then there is Colter, who to say the least pissed me off constantly. His temper was extremely unnerving and straight out unfriendly. He was angry most of the times, to a point where it wasn’t even funny anymore. I mean, I understand WHY, because the book will eventually tell you why, but that didn’t change my opinion about him.

“After centuries together, I unfortunately have grown accustomed to Colt’s temper. I think anger is the only emotion he has, or at least knows how to express.” (Kaiden)

Then there the other guys, Finn, Kaiden and Devon. They all seemed like the opposite of Colter. They were very friendly, funny and helpful. I really liked them all and I did feel bad for them, more than I did for Colter.

No matter how I look at it, I never really came to like or really care about all these characters enough to really be sad or happy when something happened to them. For example, toward the end of the book something BIG and sad happens and I must say it rather annoyed me how much they were whining about it. I mean I understand why but yeah that was just my lack of caring for what happens to them, which I found very sad.

But, in general, at first I thought I would give Retribution 4 stars, because it started out quite good and interesting but, the further I read and the closer I got, the more my rating started to decrease. Somewhere around 75% through I was already at a point where I said I’ll only give it 2.5 Stars.

All in all, maybe if you are more into the whole soul business reads, this might be a story for you, but for me personally it was a rather disappointing read. I enjoyed reading this book only up until maybe 50% in, the rest was rather a ‘continuing to read just to see how it end and be able to write a review for it’ type of thing.