Review: The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings

Author: Lindsay Cummings
Series: The Murder Complex #1
Genre: Dystopian, Young Adult
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Expected Publication: June 10, 2014

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20359867-riot

An action-packed, blood-soaked, futuristic debut thriller set in a world where the murder rate is higher than the birthrate. For fans of Moira Young’s Dust Lands series, La Femme Nikita, and the movie Hanna.

Meadow Woodson, a fifteen-year-old girl who has been trained by her father to fight, to kill, and to survive in any situation, lives with her family on a houseboat in Florida. The state is controlled by The Murder Complex, an organization that tracks the population with precision.

The plot starts to thicken when Meadow meets Zephyr James, who is—although he doesn’t know it—one of the MC’s programmed assassins. Is their meeting a coincidence? Destiny? Or part of a terrifying strategy? And will Zephyr keep Meadow from discovering the haunting truth about her family?

Review

It's a funny thing how readers sometimes perceive books. When I started reading The Murder Complex I expected an action packed, blood soaked tale of Murder, Assassins and Politicians run amok. When in reality the story was mostly your standard Young Adult Dystopian with a very good plot that didn't quite know how to execute it while still maintaining the boundaries of being Young Adult. This isn't to say The Murder Complex was a bad book, it wasn't, I just think it fell considerably below expectations based on the premise. 

One of my main issues with The Murder Complex was it had no depth, no meat. Simply put it wasn't complex. The world the story is set in is filled with Murders and Thieves looking for any opportunity to survive and thrive under it's totalitarian Government regime, OK fine, however, rather then show how brutal and dark Meadow's world is, the story instead focuses squarely on Meadow and her mommy issues right from the start of the story. It wouldn't have been so bad if Meadow wasn't so one dimensional as a character. She had zero personality and I had a real hard time warming up to her as a character.  

Another issue I had with the story was that it spent too much time trying to ensure the reader that Meadow was special and a character who must be protected. Again this wouldn't be bad if Meadow had proven herself to be a character who somehow was worthy of being spared her Government's gruesome fate for her but since I lacked the connection with her that I desperately needed to do so in order to, I'm not gonna lie it was hard, real hard.

Lastly, I think my biggest issue with the story was the romance. I really wish the Author had waited until the next book to throw these characters together. I don't think the story needed them to get together in this book at all and would've been willing to wait as long as needed to make the connection seem real and not forced for the sake of being able to add Romance into the story.  In my opinion, the Insta love aspect sort of cheapened what was going on in the book and made the impact of the ending weaker since it shifted focus to the characters in their own personal drama rather than that of the very big plot reveal going on. 

Now although I had some pretty major issues with the story, I still really enjoyed The Murder Complex.  The dystopian society hit the right notes for me in terms of look and feel and I liked aspects of how the Assassins did the dirty work of the Government for them. I even really liked some of the secondary characters Meadow meets along the way even if they had their own agendas for befriending her in the first place. 

Final Thoughts
The Murder Complex might not have been everything I hoped for but it was still a good, decently written story that I'm certainly happy to have read. I look forward to reading the sequel and figuring out things along the way. However, I will certain lower my expectations a bit in order to hopefully enjoy the story a bit more the next time around. So I guess this begs the question, Would I recommend The Murder Complex? Yes, if your a fan of Dystopians than this is one you should read this year. With that being said, I'll be rating The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings ★★★.

 *Copy provided by Netgalley.  All opinions are my own and I was not compensated in an which way  for providing them.

About the Author
Lindsay Cummings is the 20-year-old author of THE MURDER COMPLEX, as well as its sequel, coming 2014 from Greenwillow Books/HarperCollins, and the MG trilogy THE BALANCE KEEPERS, coming Fall 2014 from Katherine Tegen Books/HarperCollins.

Lindsay deals with chronic fatigue, can’t get enough of her two pesky German Shepherds, wolf cub, and two horses. She's still waiting on her letter from Hogwarts--it was probably just lost in the mail. You can follow Lindsay on twitter @lindsaycwrites or on her website http://lindsaycummingsbooks.com/ .

Comments

  1. I keep hearing a lot about this one and yeah - I guess I thought it was going to be really creepy too.

    It doesn't sound too bad though I guess - as long as you adjust your expectations going in. Which I can do because of your review lol

    ReplyDelete
  2. This sounds interesting.... The cover is kind of dark. Although you had a few issues it's good to see you still enjoyed it! Fab review!

    Naomi @ Nomi’s Paranormal Palace

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow, no depth and not so good romance? That sucks, but I am still excited to read it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yeah. Unfortunately I really felt like we were being shown just the surface level of this really complex and dark world rather than being able to access all its dark levels.

    ReplyDelete

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