Once: A YA Dystopian Sequel of Breathless Adventure, First Love, and Dangerous Survival (Eve, 2)

Originally posted for my blog, Zach's YA Reviews (http://www.zachsyareviews.com/2012/06/book-review-once-eve-novel-by-anna.html) Characters: Once again Eve is front and center in this epic dystopian sequel, obviously. This time she's changed a little bit. She's spent a great deal of time with the women of Califia and has gathered new information and knowledge. You will definitely see her as a changed women at the start of the novel. One of the things I loved most about Eve's character development is something I can't say due to the fact that it's a BIG spoiler. However, it's a big game changer and brings Eve to question what side she's really on. Next we have Caleb, who we last saw leaving Eve in Califia with injuries to his leg. When we see him this time his physical appearance changes as well as his standing in the revolution. He doesn't feel like a progressed or changed character as much, in fact he's not in the book as much as he was in the first, however it seemed intentional and well thought out. Predictability: Wow, just wow. I was utterly blown away with the twists and turns in this book. Pretty much right away things go crazy and I am caught off-guard several times. Even though there are a few things that I could see from a mile away, they weren't things that ruined the book in any sense. However the amount of twists did make this review super hard to write, as a few game-changing curve balls are thrown withing the first ten chapters. Romance: One of the things that I loved about the romance in Eve was that there was no love triangle involved. While I am a sucker for a good love triangle, I feel as though many writers only do them to cause drama and not to progress the actual story line. In Once things change a bit. Eve is catches the eye of someone else and and while she does not return his affection do to her feelings for Caleb, his attention will cause some pretty big problems. I'd have to sat that this type of love triangle is done well, not only is it realistic, but it also ties in closely with where the storyline looks to be headed. Ending: I don't know what it is with me and endings lately, maybe I still can't get over the crazy cliffhanger from another book I recently read. but most of the endings I have read lately fall short of my expectations. I do have to admit that this ending is shocking and makes you go, "WHAT!?" but the last sentence isn't something that you will freak out about. Which may be a good thing, as I've said in previous posts, a crazy cliffhanger of an ending is a bittersweet thing, it may give you that adrenaline rush, but it makes the wait for the next installment seem much longer than it really is. I think it was done well but I would have liked a more cliffhanger like ending. Overall I give this book a full 5 out of 5 stars. It's fun and engaging, and I could never seem to put it down. I would say if you haven't read Eve yet go pick it up at your local bookstore or if you would rather borrow it from your local library that's cool too, and then don't forget to pick up a copy of Once here on Amazon!

This book was SO much better than I was expecting! I love it when a book throws me completely off guard, and that's exactly what happened when I read Once, the much anticipated follow up to Eve by Anna Carey. After a series of events gone wrong, Eve is now trapped in the City of Sand, at the mercy of none other than the King of New America. Here she discovers an unsettling secret about her past, and must try to come to terms with what this secret means for her future. It's up to Eve to do whatever she has to do to save the ones she loves. Eve has definitely come a long way since I first met her in the previous book. She is no longer the sheltered, naïve young lady. Here we see a girl that has been through more than any girl should ever have to go through, and she's a survivor. She's also very strong and determined, and I found that to be so refreshing compared to the girl we first met. As if I thought I couldn't love Caleb more than I did in the previous book, I fell in love with him even more in this sequel. Unfortunately, we don't get to see him quite as much as I hoped, but the parts of the book that he is in are extra special. I adore the relationship between him and Eve. We are also introduced to quite a few new characters in Once, and there are a few characters that you are going to love to hate. (I sure did, anyways.) A few of our favorite characters from the previous book make a comeback as well, and it was interesting as well as heartbreaking to see what had happened to some of them. Once is filled with lots of different twists that will keep you guessing right up to the end. When I actually had time to sit down and read, I flew through the pages, just because I needed to know what was going to happen next. There were quite a few emotional parts in the book that had me tearing up as well. (Blah!) The ending of the book is another massive cliffhanger, which has left me completely pining for the next book in the series. (Must we really wait until next spring??) Overall, I really enjoyed this sequel. I was super curious to see how things would play out for Eve and Caleb, and I definitely wasn't disappointed. Bring on the next book in this series, and quickly, please!

good series

I don't even know how to write this review. I guess I could start by saying that I stayed up until 3am reading ONCE. And I'm exhausted from lack of sleep, but I have no regrets. There was no way that I could possibly stop reading until I finished. ONCE was that wonderful. What can I say about ONCE without spoiling it? I honestly feel like nothing. But I'll try. Luckily the blurb does a lot to help me out, because it pretty much lays out the story. ONCE picks up three months after Caleb leaves Eve at Califia. Eve is managing, but her moments are spent wishing for Caleb, to simply be with him again, even if it means living in the wild. As it turns out, no matter where Eve ends up, she's always trapped. After ending up in the City of Sand, Eve is dealt the king of all shockers, spinning her into a whole new orbit. Determined to fight for her own future, Caleb's future, the future of all New Americans, Eve's sense of loyalty, love, and sacrifice are put to the ultimate test. Many times, middle books in a series are a letdown, a filler. That is not the case in ONCE. This story had so much packed into the pages. The dramatic revelations were shocking. I seriously didn't see any of it coming. The action was intense. Eve is a continual force, never halting her search for an escape. What got me most of all was the love story. Sadly, Caleb and Eve are separated for most of the story, but he is always in her thoughts. When the are together, it is absolutely magical. I literally held my heart while reading several particularly beautiful moments. They were subtle, and breathtaking. After finishing ONCE I had one single thought: My heart hurts. I won't say the ending was cruel. In fact, as far as cliffhangers go, it was quite brilliant. I am already counting down the days until April 2, 2013, the day book three, RISE, releases. Favorite Quote: "I was convinced we would return to one another - it was only the how and when that had yet to be decided." (pg 56, ARC) "I'd spent so many years preparing for this moment, just so I could steel myself against it. But it didn't feel like that. Not now - not with Caleb. He was asking for permission, his face mirroring all the nervousness I felt. I want to be closer to you, he seemed to say, as he bit down on his bottom lip. Will you let me?" (pg 183-4, ARC)

As a big fan of dystopias and young adult lit, the premise of this soon-to-be trilogy appealed to me. Anna Carey has created an intriguing setting. A world, destroyed by illness, struggling to rebuild and going to radical lengths to ensure there will be a future generation of children to repopulate the country. The writing is above par for young adult literature. Carey manages to write a romance without a hint of scandal, making it an age-appropriate book for younger readers while keeping everyone else intrigued. That’s the good part. The Eve series reeks of lazy world building. The premise in book one is so flimsy that it creates an unstable ground for the rest of the series. In a world where you desperately needed compliant, fertile girls to be breeders. Why in the world would you provide them with the finest education? Teach them to paint? Expose them to fine literature? Just so they can be shuttled across the river and breed? A more realistic breeding stock would have been a bunch of illiterate girls who had been fed propaganda about the noble nature of repopulating the country. A bunch of illiterate girls who couldn’t even read a road sign if they ever escaped, much less a map or a coded message. But no. In the Eve books, the breeding stock is made up of the finest, best-educated girls in the country, for apparently no other reason than Carey wanted to have an interesting, well-read protagonist. That’s book one. Book two brings its own issues. Carey has created a world where Eve was orphaned in the plague at age five and is now eighteen. Thirteen years have passed and the United States has abandoned all premise of democracy and crowned a king. Like the extra-educated breeding stock, this decision seems to be entirely for the purpose of creating a pseudo-fairy tale world where we can call Eve ‘Princess’. There is also absolutely no reason why Eve would be ‘playing along’ with the princess act. She supposedly does not want to live a newly revitalized Vegas (which is an odd place for the new dawn of society given its water access issues which require considerable labor and energy, which would be sparse in a world where 98% of the population had been wiped out…) but plays nice for reasons unknown. I would have loved to see her blow the top off the breeding farms, she really has no reason not to. But instead, she acts out a dystopian version of ‘What a Girl Wants’ with her cousin Clara. That being said, I read books one and two in a week’s span. The writing is appealing enough that these glaring plot holes didn’t stop me from reading, just gave me cause for eye rolling.

As much as I try to escape them, book trilogies keep pulling me back in. I'll love the first book, the second will be a major disappointment, and the third will somehow manage to make me love it more than I thought I could. I loved Eve and wanted to keep reading Eve's story, even though most book sequels disappoint me and only act as a bridge between the first and last books. Carey didn't fall into this trap. She wrote a book that had its own identity, while still needing the other books to tell a complete story. In Once, there's a pretty big opening shock. I certainly didn't see it coming. But I liked it. It made things different than how I thought they'd go. The other plot twists have me thinking about people differently and looking at who I trust and who I don't. I love when an author can mess me around that much and still make me love a book. Of course, this isn't a standalone novel. You need to read Eve in order to know about Once. However, Once does stand by itself in the sense that it has its own stories, its own plot that are different from those in Eve. It serves as a set-up for Rise, but it's more than just the set-up. Thank you, thank you, thank you to Anna Carey for writing a sequel that wasn't novel-length filler. Eve and Caleb are still ever present and had my heart pulling for them so hard. They jump into some decisions, just like teens would, regardless of their circumstances. But they also are great planners and can think of nothing more than how to get to the future where they are together. One plot twist had my heart breaking, even though I saw it coming. I just want the future for these two that they dream of. Once was a wonderful sequel that jumped right over the trap of the sequel slump. There's love, action and plotting. It had me completely engrossed from start to end. It's going to be a long, long wait for the finale and I can't wait to get my hands on it.

ONCE is the absolutely thrilling, edge-of-your-seat exciting and utterly heartbreaking second book in author Anna Carey's Eve trilogy. Picking up a few months after EVE left off, this story transports readers once again to a world that is still recovering from the plague that ravaged it, to a country whose leader is a cruel dictator, and to a safe haven that is starting not to feel so safe. Filled with even more surprises, betrayals and heartbreak, a new setting to explore and new characters to meet, ONCE will keep readers hanging on to every word as they follow Eve to the City of Sand, discover what life is really like for its citizens and learn whether the King is someone who can be trusted or should be feared. Califia was not everything Eve had hoped it would be. Unable to forget all that she had lost, when given the chance to flee, she took it. But life outside of Califia was just as dangerous as ever and ending up in the City of Sand was an outcome that proved to be inevitable. However, life inside the City was not at all what Eve expected it would be. Especially when discoveries were made that threatened to turn her entire world upside down. Discoveries that will force her to choose whether to fight her fate and risk her safety or accept it and risk her only chance at happiness. Fast-paced and suspenseful, ONCE will keep readers engaged as they take this next step in Eve's journey. With characters old and new to connect with, to be betrayed by, to be heartbroken over, to love and to distrust, this story brings nerve-wracking tension to the page. It gives readers a heroine they can root for. And it leaves them hanging off the edge of a pretty big cliff with a number of questions still to be answered. Anna Carey has dived a little deeper into the world she created and showed readers its heart - the City of Sand. The author allowed her heroine to grow, even with every obstacle she put in Eve's way, or perhaps because of them. And she challenged readers to uncover the secrets, the lies, the deception and the characters behind them all. With shocking twists and turns that will keep readers guessing, a world that will give them the chills, a love story that will leave them heartbroken and an ending that will make them desperate to find out just what comes next, ONCE is an absolute must read second book in this electrifying and immensely entertaining series.

There are many things that I love about this series: First of all, it's a bit darker than most books. The world is a desolate scary place, especially for a young girl. Second: I love the strength and determination of Eve. She is a great and loyal friend, willing to do anything for those she cares about. Third: I love that the unexpected happens. Just when you think the story is going in one direction, BAM something totally unexpected happens and you want to scream "What?!?!?!?" You are on the edge of your seat, biting your nails, just waiting to see what happens next. I love that this is an original story, so different, and so much better than most of the other young adult books out there right now. The writing is great, the characters are well written, the story is unique. Give it a try. You'll be glad you did.

This story and the other two in the trilogy are all easy to read and the story flows really well.They have something for everyone,action,romance,suspence and lots ofadventure at a fast pace.I would recommend the age about 15 plus as some content may not be appropriate for a younger reader. They are hugely enjoyable and a great read.

Arrived in perfect condition and a timely matter.

Liked this book, pleasantly surprised. I often read this genre and most have the three book series too. Book two is often a space filler and to a degree this was too, the story did flow, but no major twists happens until the end, that being said, it did add to the story and I'm guessing will set ways for the third instalment .I like the characters and the story flows well so far... Not going to spoil it for anyone but if you've read books like the flow series, the testing series or the watchers of Eden (some of my more recent reads) I'm sure you'll like this too... dystopia... Female lead... Struggles and twists... And a subtle love interest...

Loving this series- struggle to put the books down

Much preferred to the first book, as Eve is so much stronger and definitely not as annoying! The story gets more interesting too, with more characters to add depth. Proof that if you put up with Eve in the first, you WILL be rewarded.