Review of Doomed

Description from Goodreads

Beat the game. Save the world.

Pandora’s an average teen, glued to her cell phone and laptop, until the day her long-lost father sends her a link to a mysterious site featuring photos of her as a child. Curious, Pandora enters the site, unwittingly unleashing a global computer virus that plunges the whole world into panic: suddenly, there’s no Internet. No cell phones. No traffic lights, hospitals or law enforcement. Only Pandora’s Box, a virtual-reality game created by Pandora’s father, remains up and running. Together with her neighbors, gorgeous stepbrothers Eli and Theo, Pandora must follow the photographs from her childhood in an attempt to beat the game and track down her father—and rescue the world. Part The Matrix, part retelling of the Pandora myth, Doomed has something for gaming fans, dystopian fans, and romance fans alike.

My Review

“Moving forward is the only way to survive”.

This quote describes Doomed perfectly. Pandora, the main character and her two friends, Eli and Theo, seem to never stop. They always seem to be faced with a task to solve or a problem to get out of. This makes for a real page-turner and I found myself reading for hours without stopping. I couldn’t wait to see what these three characters would encounter next! I also enjoyed how the author utilized the Pandora’s Box game and incorporated it seamlessly into the real life action. The character development was also amazing. Watching each of them grow as the story progressed really made me realize how much an event of that magnitude can change a person.

Pandora is one of the better main characters that I have encountered lately. She grew up without her mom or dad being around so she tends to be a pretty strong person. However, I feel that she didn’t always reach her full potential. She tended to break down a lot and had to be rescued by the guys. However, she did prove herself a few times so she was a very likeable character overall.

When I first encountered Eli and Theo, I was not impressed. Eli seemed like the typical flirt and Theo had that whole ‘mysterious and dark’ side that I am getting sick of reading about. However, as I learned more about them, I began to understand how they got to be the way that they were. . They are both very complex characters that have different pasts that have shaped them differently.  They both grew on me and I enjoyed watching them both develop as the book progressed. I almost enjoyed them more then Pandora.

Speaking of complicated, then we have Pandora’s father. As the reader, you pretty much hate him because of how Pandora feels about him. I personally could not stand him but some people may enjoy him. If you would like to discuss this topic, let me know and I would be happy to explain my feelings towards him.

Even though I found this book to very enjoyable overall, I did have a few issues with it. I feel that certain issues could have been explored more to add some depth to the story. For example, I personally would have liked to learn more about Pandora’s parent’s relationship. I also felt that some of the action scenes were described in a confusing manner. I sometimes found it difficult to know what was really happening. Lastly, I found the ending to be extremely disappointing. It felt very rushed and lacked detail. This book could have easily been split into two, which may have been helpful in providing more details and depth to the plot.

Overall, I found this book to be an enjoyable read. It was interesting to read about how people would react in the face of a crisis. It really made me think about what I would do if I were faced with the situation that Pandora was.