Review: Nobody by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Title: Nobody
Author: Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Publisher: EgmontUSA
Publication Date: January 22, 2012
Links: Amazon | Goodreads
Source: Publicist
There are people in this world who are Nobody. No one sees them. No one notices them. They live their lives under the radar, forgotten as soon as you turn away.

That’s why they make the perfect assassins.

The Institute finds these people when they’re young and takes them away for training. But an untrained Nobody is a threat to their organization. And threats must be eliminated.

Sixteen-year-old Claire has been invisible her whole life, missed by the Institute’s monitoring. But now they’ve ID’ed her and send seventeen-year-old Nix to remove her. Yet the moment he lays eyes on her, he can’t make the hit. It’s as if Claire and Nix are the only people in the world for each other. And they are—because no one else ever notices them.
Meh. I liked the concept of Nobody, but the execution didn't do it for me.

Claire is angsty and Nix is self-loathing, which is understandable. But the story spends a little too much time on that and not enough time on the cool stuff like assassins and conspiracies and action. The romance is an insta-love and, though it makes a little sense that they'd each be immediately drawn into a desire for some kind of an intimacy with the only other person in the world who can actually see them, remember them, care about them, and that they would be craving that attention and affection after many years of not having a connection with anyone, I still feel like the relationship development is too intense, too fast. The story takes place in about a week and already there were I love yous and forevers being thrown around. Character development is something that I wanted more of, beyond the feelings of loneliness, angst and self-loathing. I would rather have seen less time spent on the angst and self-loathing (even though I think that stuff should definitely be in there), and more time spent on the working toward a common goal and getting to know each other as the characters develop through their personalities and interactions.

The plot has a pretty quick pace, for the most part. The world building was ehh, but there were some scenes that do stand out in the mind, such as Nix's stark white room. Some of the science could have been better explained, and there were things that went beyond science that didn't make much sense at all, but still could have worked for me if those ideas and the fantastical reasoning behind them had been explored a little more/better.

There are still some fun scenes in the book that I enjoyed and it is quick and decent enough that I finished it, but overall I'm feeling pretty meh about it because I wanted more from it. Nobody had potential but unfortunately I feel like that potential was not met. Others might like the romance and find this to be an adorable story, etc., etc. But I wanted ASSASSINS. I wanted sneaky killers. I wanted vengeance, preferably of the cold and ruthless sort. And I didn't really get that. I got more fluff and less ASSASSIN, and that just wasn't what I was hoping for.


6 comments:

  1. I want assassins, too. I just won a copy of this, so we'll see how much the lack of assassins bothers me. But it sounds like the fluff might get in the way of my enjoyment. :(

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    1. I don't think the fluff would have gotten in my way if it had been more natural. Oh well. :|

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  2. I've seen mixed reviews on this one. The concept sounds fabulous, I'm sad to hear you felt it wasn't executed well. I read Hysteria recently and had the exact same sentiments.

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    1. Yeah, it just wasn't what I was hoping for at all. It started off pretty cool and kinda creepy but then it was sort of downhill from there.

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  3. Yikes! I've always wanted to read Nobody, ever since I first saw it on a WoW post! Now insta-love and angsty teens aren't really what I bargained for... I'll have to be careful before I pick this one up, great review though :)

    -Alicia
    Book a World

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    1. Yeah, lol. It isn't what I was hoping for. Good for some people perhaps, just not my cuppa.

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