New Release Review: The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee
Thank you so much to HarperCollins for the advance copy of The Thousandth Floor by Katherine McGee! The Thousandth Floor just released this week and I hope you all give this very interesting book some thought, and check out my spoiler-free review below!
The Thousandth Floor (The Thousandth Floor #1) by Katharine McGee
Category: Young Adult, Mystery, Sci-fi
Publication: August 30th, 2016; HarperCollins
Purchase: Amazon
New York City as you’ve never seen it before. A thousand-story tower stretching into the sky. A glittering vision of the future, where anything is possible—if you want it enough.
Welcome to Manhattan, 2118.
A hundred years in the future, New York is a city of innovation and dreams. But people never change: everyone here wants something…and everyone has something to lose.
Leda Cole’s flawless exterior belies a secret addiction—to a drug she never should have tried and a boy she never should have touched.
Eris Dodd-Radson’s beautiful, carefree life falls to pieces when a heartbreaking betrayal tears her family apart.
Rylin Myers’s job on one of the highest floors sweeps her into a world—and a romance—she never imagined…but will her new life cost Rylin her old one?
Watt Bakradi is a tech genius with a secret: he knows everything about everyone. But when he’s hired to spy by an upper-floor girl, he finds himself caught up in a complicated web of lies.
And living above everyone else on the thousandth floor is Avery Fuller, the girl genetically designed to be perfect. The girl who seems to have it all—yet is tormented by the one thing she can never have.
Debut author Katharine McGee has created a breathtakingly original series filled with high-tech luxury and futuristic glamour, where the impossible feels just within reach. But in this world, the higher you go, the farther there is to fall…
Review:
[book rating=3.5/5]Up here on the roof, so close to the stars, she felt young and alive and hateful.
The Thousandth Floor, a futuristic young adult novel, takes places in 2118, in a Manhattan that many couldn’t dream up. You see in this city and this future, the haves and the have nots are separated by what floor they live on in the massive behemoth known simply as The Tower. The Tower felt like a character unto itself with its hidden secrets and high tech wizardry. Anyone who is anyone lives on the upper floors, if you live on one of the lower floors you are pretty much sealed into a fate of poverty and drudgery.
The story is told from five alternating points of view. First there are, Leda, Eris and Avery, all whom are part of the privileged class. Avery, being the most wealthy, as she and her family occupy the highly coveted top floor of The Tower. Then there is Watt who lives a middle class existence helping his family survive by using his hacking skills. Then finally Rylin, who lives on one of the lowest level floors and is a struggling working class girl, chasing the next high, as she attempts to raise her baby sister. Every character has lots of secrets and something to protect and herein lies the the fuel that keeps this story interesting.
Five alternating views can be a bit overwhelming, but I found that I liked the change in voice. However, it became immediately apparent whose stories I favored, Avery was my clear favorite, and those I wanted to skim over. What was challenging with this story was that most of the characters didn’t have that many redeeming qualities. Even Avery, my favorite, I found some of her over the top opulence and clear lack of awareness irritating. Even those characters that came from the lower floors were really only out for themselves and it became very hard to figure out why I would truly care what happened to any of these characters. In addition, I found the pacing to be a bit slow at times. While all the stories eventually interlinked, it took way too long to get to the point and I think it bogged down the the story and pacing.
The novel has been compared to a futuristic Gossip Girl and I would totally agree with that assessment. For most of the story I could really see it as a TV show (hello CW) and the imagery and the technology described in this book really was something unique. However, no one in this story is perfect, not even Avery, who was literally engineered to be perfect. I think that some of the characters could have benefited from a bit more depth. At the end of the day most of the characters are spoiled rich kids, living opulent but unfulfilled lives. If you can get past all that, you have an interesting futuristic YA that will surely entertain you.
I am happy to say that I didn’t really guess who was going to ‘fall’ in this book until the very end, but sadly I found that I didn’t much care once this character was revealed. I hope that in book two, our remaining characters grow and mature. The sequel is going to be about a whole lot of blackmail so it should make for an interesting read that I know I will be picking up.
