Lauren's Crammed Bookshelf: Blog Tour: Road to Eugenica by A.M. Rose (Review & Giveaway!)

Road to Eugenica by A.M. Rose

Release Date: February 5, 2018

Publisher: Entangled Teen

Genre: YA, Time Travel, Romance

Source: ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

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Two dimensions - And the girl who connects them.

Yesterday, Drea Smith couldn’t do anything spectacular—even walking and texting at the same time was a challenge. But today, she suddenly has more answers than Google, can speak and understand numerous languages, and she can fight. Like a boss.

Super freaky.

Drea has no idea where her encyclopedic knowledge has come from, but she’ll take it when she discovers someone out there knows her secret and wants her badly. And that they’ve been searching for her since she was born.

Since she was created.

With the help of her best friend Dylan, who just wants to keep her safe, and Maddox, a mysterious new boy who is prepared to get her answers, Drea will have to push her new skills to their limit as she uncovers nothing is quite what it seems.

As she uncovers…Eugenica.

Review:

Road to Eugenica has been high on my wish list ever since I first heard about it. I love the cover and the tagline is 100% attention-grabbing. Plus have I ever been able to resist a debut? The answer: no!

The result? I liked but didn't love Road to Eugenica. I thought the premise was strong and the characters likable as well as interesting; however, I wish there had been more development. When it came to the romance, world building, and plot development, I was left feeling....underwhelmed.

Drea is a fun character. I found her to be feisty as well as likable. I loved seeing how passionate she was when it came to photography. Plus the photography hobby brought about a lot of drool-worthy descriptions of California. I also appreciated her connection to her father. It was sweet and well developed - I wish there had been more scenes between them. Dylan, Drea's best friend, was another great addition. He seemed like such a great guy; however, I did hate how seemed to be stringing Drea along. There was so many times I wanted to scream, "just admit your feelings!" Maddox, the new guy on the scene, was one character I just couldn't bring myself to like, though. There was something just so incredibly off about him, and he was also a hard character to get a grasp on. I couldn't tell if he was a bad guy, or a good guy, and honestly, his actions made little to no sense. He was a big question mark.

The premise is what originally appealed to me. I love books where an ordinary person suddenly becomes extraordinary, especially when there seems to be bad guys lurking around every corner, and that's exactly what I got here. It was interesting to see Drea go from being the scared and average teenager to someone who could speak several languages, hack into email accounts, and fight off men twice her size. Those scenes were actually some of my favorites!

However, while I enjoyed the premise and some of the development that came with it, more times that one I was left feeling underwhelmed. I wanted more - more world building, more of what Eugenica is, more about Drea's mom and the secrets she seems to posses, more on Maddox and Dylan, more on that green-eyed man. Over the course of the story, I kept waiting and waiting for big reveals to happen, for everything to suddenly become crystal clear, but that never seemed to occur. Yes, we got snippets of info here and there, but it just didn't feel like enough - even at the end, I was left thinking, "wait, what just happened?!" Also, I didn't completely like the romance. Drea's feelings seemed to be all over the place - one minute she loved Dylan, the next she seemed to be infatuated with Maddox and hating on Dylan, and the next she was gaga over Dylan again. It was incredibly inconsistent. I'm all for multiple love interests and crushes, but here it just didn't work well. I couldn't "get" Drea's reasoning sometimes, and it didn't help that I thought Maddox was creepy from the get go.

Despite these aspects, Road to Eugenica is a promising start. I have hope that the sequel will dive deeper into the world and give more answers.

3 stars!!

About the Author:

A.M. Rose is the author of Road to Eugenica, and writer of young adult novels of all genres as long as they have a hint of romance, the drinker of too much coffee (with way too much coconut creamer), and lover of all carbohydrates.

Currently, she lives in Houston, TX with her three boys (yes, her husband is in that count) and three cats. When she isn’t writing about swoony boys or ways for her MC to get into trouble, she is an avid reader, critiquer, (is that even a word?) and trampoline enthusiast.

A.M. Rose is a graduate from San Diego State University with a BA in Communication and a minor in underwater basket weaving. (Okay, maybe not the basket weaving part.)