In complete transparency, by halfway through this book I was convinced that it had been mis-marketed. (While it was good, it was not at all what I was expecting. Which unfortunately meant that I was not enjoying it as much as I had hoped.) I picked this book up thinking it would be a sci-fi novel, instead what I had gotten was a mystery novel. However, by two thirds of the way in I realized that it was, in fact, marketed correctly.
That being said, I would venture to say the first half of this book was very much a mystery novel following a detective trying to redeem her past and move forward. It wasn't until roughly halfway when we start to see more of the picture. By the last third the science fiction elements really picked up. The author melds the two genres beautifully and smoothly transforms this murder mystery into a speculative sci-fi. By the end of the novel the book had completely transformed. I was absolutely blown away when everything was explained and the mystery was revealed. I can honestly say I did not see it coming.
Due to the book not being what I was expecting at first I rated this one 4.25/5. If we separate the books into two parts I would (personally) rate them at 2.5/5 for the first half & 5/5 for the second half. I can honestly say, had I known this was going to be more a mystery novel the rating for the first half would have fallen somewhere around 4/5 making this book 4.5/5. You might be asking how the first half being 2 stars higher only increased the overall rating by .25. The answer is simply that the ending was so strong it completely made up for the first half of the book.
All in all, this was worth the read. Just know if you decide to pick it up you will be reading a mystery novel with an ending comparable to Blake Crouch's speculative science fiction books. The intricacy of the mystery is very similar to Blake Crouch's writing. I think the largest difference is from who's eyes you are watching the story unfold. With Blake Crouch, we are in the midst of the science fiction elements from the beginning due to the characters creating or somehow being involved with the creation of scifi technology. Whereas with Adam Hamdy, we are seeing the story unfold from an entirely different perspective.
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