The Adoration of Jenna Fox Review

Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend! Friday, I sunburned my face while swimming for four hours and then went to see Despicable Me (very cute movie). Saturday, I hung out at home and screamed when Quality Road lost to Blame (I'm a Quality Road girl) and screamed some more when Zenyatta won her 18th straight race therefore stamping herself as one of the greatest racehorses of all time. Sunday, I spent five hours in the basement of the church painting our youth group meeting hall with primer (surprisingly fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon). Okay, now on the things you actually care about.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson
Seventeen-year-old Jenna Fox has just awoken from a year-long coma -- so she's been told -- and she is still recovering from the terrible accident that caused it. But what happened before that? She's been given home movies chronicling her entire life, which spark memories to surface. But are the memories really hers? And why won't anyone in her family talk about the accident? Jenna is becoming more curious. But she is also afraid of what she might find out if she ever gets up the courage to ask her questions. What happened to Jenna Fox? And who is she, really?

***WARNING: On most of my reviews I have a section without spoilers and then a section with them. I didn't have much that would be spoilery that I wanted to talk about with this book so I'm leaving off the spoiler section. I apologize for any small spoilers that might have slipped through in this review. I tried to keep it as spoiler-free as possible.***

I bought this book expecting to hear a contemporary story of a girl dealing with waking up from a coma. I did not get that. Instead I got an intriguing sci-fi story of a girl that should've died but didn't and is now struggling to figure out who she is in the wake of the accident. It was way better than what I expected.

Every time I started to read this book, I got sucked into it. I started reading it at one a.m. when I couldn't sleep one night and didn't stop until two-thirty because I refused to put it down.

I loved Jenna's personality and her confusion over who she was. I also loved her confusion over certain words that she couldn't remember. Like in one scene she calls her grandmother a swearword because she thinks it means "annoying."

Dane intrigued me. I wasn't quite sure what to think about him. I'm kind of annoyed that we never really figure out what it is that was wrong with him.

I loved Ethan and I was curious and a little cautious about him at first.

I still can't believe the twist with Allys. I didn't see it coming until it was there and then I realized how obvious it should have been.

The only real drawback I found with this book was there were a couple of things that I'm still curious about. A couple of threads that didn't really get tied up. Specifically with the Dane thing and the bill.

Overall: 10/10. Original premise, beautiful writing, and dealing wonderfully with one side of an issue that could be very real in tomorrow's society.

Comments

Nomes said…
I loved this book too.

The dane thing intrigued me as well - i think maybe her style is to not tie everything up

i love d the kind of epilogue-y bit./ gave the whole premise and world so much more scope and depth.

sounds like a good weekend - apart from getting sun burnt.
August 9, 2010 at 7:19 PM
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