Pawn by Aimee Carter

In Pawn by Aimee Carter Kitty Doe lives in a world where people are ranked, and being given a III means a short life of misery. When she has the chance to become a VII, the highest rank possible, she takes it. What she doesn't realize is that agreeing means becoming Masked-- surgically transformed into the Lila Hart, a member of the royal family who died and whose family doesn't want the public to know. It turns out the reason she died was that she was helping start a rebellion, and it's up to Kitty to stop it. But what happens if it's a rebellion she believes in as well?

Unfortunately, even though it had a really cool concept I had a lot of issues with Pawn. Kitty is a pretty weak character a lot of the times (or she is randomly strong in a way that doesn't seem consistent) and she just does things like going with the government to become a VII without knowing at all what that entails. It's also one of those books where the whole point is that everyone has secrets and Kitty doesn't know them and has to find things out. So basically at the end of the book, not much has actually happened, but Kitty knows a lot more, setting it up for book 2. That said, there was enough intensity and intrigue in Pawn to keep my attention and keep me reading.

I expected Pawn to really be about a rebellion, but it was mainly about a royal family and dynamics, set in a dystopian world. The dystopia itself was pretty predictable, borrowing lots of elements like the caste system from many other books. I also felt like most of the characters didn't have a lot of depth, and I didn't really believe or enjoy the romance element and am glad it wasn't bigger in the book. I never really got the connection between Kitty and Benjy, except that they were together because they lived in the same house.  

Pawn by Aimee Carter is a book with a great concept that it unfortunately doesn't really deliver on and instead works mainly to set up for a sequel instead of having much content on its own. However, there was enough interesting aspects that I will be picking up the sequel when it is released.


Release Date: November 26th 2013 Pages: 346  Format: Egalley
Source: Netgalley  Publisher: Harlequin TEEN  Buy It: Book Depository