Resist by Sarah Crossan

Resist by Sarah Crossan
Series: Breathe #2
Genre: Post Apocalyptic
Release Date: October 8, 2013
Publisher: Greenwillow
Source: Publisher
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Bea, Alina, and Quinn are on the run. They started a rebellion and were thrown out of the pod, the only place where there's enough oxygen to breathe. Bea has lost her family. Alina has lost her home. And Quinn has lost his privileged life. Can they survive in the perilous Outlands? Can they finish the revolution they began? Especially when a young operative from the pod's Special Forces is sent after them. Their only chance is to stand together, even when terrible circumstances force them apart. When the future of human society is in danger, these four teens must decide where their allegiances lie. Sarah Crossan has created a dangerous, and shattered society in this wrenching, thought-provoking, and unforgettable post-apocalyptic novel.

I very much enjoyed Breathe when it came out last year, and I have been eagerly anticipating the release of Resist. Bring on the rebellion! While I did enjoy Resist, there were some issues that I had with it. Some aspects of the novel felt rather underdeveloped, and I think adding an extra hundred pages would have given Crossan time to cover things properly. There was just so much happening in this book that it was difficult to evenly develop and progress certain parts.

I think that more backstory on Vanya would have been a good thing. She was very mysterious, and I appreciated that, but I wanted to know much more about her once the book had ended. It didn’t feel as though we had enough time to get to know her or her motives, and so she was an underdeveloped villain. So much more could have been done with her character, and I was very disappointed by the lack of focus on her once I had finished the book.

Speaking of villains, Maks was also another one who was underdeveloped, at least for me. He is a citizen of Sequoia, and Vanya’s right hand man. One character warns others about Maks before they even meet, which set up the fact that Maks is an awful person, and shouldn’t be trusted. However, I don’t think he lived up to the expectations of him being Voldemort’s equivalent. Okay, that’s going a bit far, but it was strongly implied and stated that Maks was evil/crazy. And yes, he is an arsehole and I think he should be shot, but after Alina had interacted with him a little, he didn’t seem so bad as the other characters had been saying. I was expecting craziness, not an average bad guy.

Another thing I wanted was more time in Sequoia. That place was bloody creepy, and I enjoyed reading about the characters’ discoveries while they were they, but it seemed as though as soon as they got there, they were out again in seconds. To be fair, I did read the entire book on a plane, and so the whole book went by really fast for me, but I would have loved to have seen more focus on this place.

I loved that there was no love triangle in this one. Quinn is totally over his feelings for Alina, and while Bea meets a new guy, it’s totally platonic. The characters even address the fact that there would never been anything romantic between Bea and Ronan, because they’re only BFF material. Repeat after me: AWWWWWW. Despite there clearly being no love triangle whatsoever, I still shipped Bea with Ronan because Ronan is hot and my shipping feels cannot be tamed.

I loved the way this book ending. It was tragic, there were lots of victims on both sides of the war, and there were a couple of surprises too. The relationships between the characters were wrapped up well, and I love that Quinn in particular got some closure. I also love how Alina’s story went, because it made me cry and I wasn’t expecting to feel that way about her. She’s a hero.

Sarah Crossan delivered a fantastic story about love and friendship and survival, and I am so happy that I enjoyed both books in this series. One of the reasons that I love dystopian novels so much is that the “little folk” rise up (usually) against their suppressors, and can you really get more suppressed than the government denying you of oxygen?