Book Review- Dualed

I finished reading Dualed today by Elsie Chapman for an Around the World ARC Tour.

The city of Kersh is a safe haven, but the price of safety is high. Everyone has a genetic Alternate—a twin raised by another family—and citizens must prove their worth by eliminating their Alts before their twentieth birthday. Survival means advanced schooling, a good job, marriage—life.

Fifteen-year-old West Grayer has trained as a fighter, preparing for the day when her assignment arrives and she will have one month to hunt down and kill her Alt. But then a tragic misstep shakes West’s confidence. Stricken with grief and guilt, she’s no longer certain that she’s the best version of herself, the version worthy of a future. If she is to have any chance of winning, she must stop running not only from her Alt, but also from love . . . though both have the power to destroy her.

Elsie Chapman's suspenseful YA debut weaves unexpected romance into a novel full of fast-paced action and thought-provoking philosophy. When the story ends, discussions will begin about this future society where every adult is a murderer and every child knows there is another out there who just might be better.

Well, this was one action packed book.  Which I don't normally completely enjoy, unless it has a lot of character-ness (is that a word?) about it too.  Which this one didn't.  I never really got West.  She was always distant.  And usually that puts me off but for some reason, I enjoyed this book.

Maybe it was the premise was so unique.  To have another person out there, a twin in a sense, that you have to kill to survive and become an adult.  And once you complete that kill, a whole new world opens up to you.  Yup, pretty unique to me.

I liked Chord.  I liked how protective of West he was, yet he still let her go through with what she felt she needed to.  Like I said earlier, West seemed pretty cold to me.  I know that she was portrayed that way because of what she went through in life but it still made it pretty hard to feel sympathetic for her.  And I find it kind of odd that she was so heartless in killing as a Striker yet when it came time for her own completion, she took so long to do it.

But I'm definitely interested to see what happens in the next book, Divided.  There wasn't a cliffhanger at the end of the book and it could easily be a standalone.  I'll be looking forward to reading it though.

I gave this book a rating of 4/5.

Dualed will be released on February 26, 2013.

This book fulfills items in the following challenges:
2013 150+ Reading Challenge: 4
2013 ARC Reading Challenge: 3
2013 Debut Author Challenge: 2
2013 Young Adult Reading Challenge: 3
2013 Quick Fix Challenge: 2

*FTC Disclosure: I was given this book for free for an honest review as part of the Around the World Tours.