This book is rather confusing in its explanation of the world the narrative takes place in. The dystopian, underground premise was promising but the execution, ultimately, was not.

DNF at 25%. It's been over four years since I received this ARC. I gave it a go and have decided it is not for me. It interested me then and no longer does now.

I think this was a 'good intentions, bad execution' kind of book. The story and writing was written so confusingly that I frustratedly felt disinterested in the characters and the plot. I wish there had been more to this.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this book. Unfortunately it’s not the book for me. DNF @ 13%.

Unfortunately, I didn't have time to finish this book, and cannot provide substantial feedback. I really liked what I have read, and hope to finish it when I have the chance!

Blind the Eyes was such a capturing, unnerving, and original novel that even though I wasn't always sure I knew what was going on, it kept my attention.

Set in a future of conformity and stability above everything else, it doesn't take long to realise our protagonist isn't the most reliable of narrators. It's not anything malicious, but from one moment to the next, you're never entirely sure who can be trusted - if they're even real. There's a certain amount of reader involvement that's needed to keep track of the narrative, but the writing is absolutely gorgeous and makes the work a pleasure.

Okay, anyone I know read this book? Because it gave me serious Annihilation vibes for most of it. Not only the stairway parts, but I feel like something about the writing just reminded me so much of that. The whole thing just really felt like a dream, and so did Annihilation. It might just be me alone thinking that though. Either way, I'm caught between rating this three or four stars, because although it was really interesting and unique, it just wasn't my new favourite book. That doesn't mean it wasn't good, though.

Following a girl named Cole, at the beginning of the story we find her working surveillance. That means, in her world of the Refuge, all grey everything, everyone looking and acting the same, and never wanting or wishing or dreaming of anything, for fear the Mara will come and kill them. Very interesting and horrifying, this gory book had me constantly on my toes waiting for the next strike from the monsters, but I couldn't really picture them. She works very hard to stay neutral in all aspects of her life after losing her memories and gaining a ghost named Cadence to the monsters not long ago, but it's not enough. It seems like someone's just out to get her.

After being called up to investigate something on a medical floor, she's lost. Her ghost is always pestering her and telling her what to do, but she knows she needs to stay safe and ignore her. That is, until she's headed up to investigate, and stopped by a boy who says he can get her out of Refuge. She doesn't trust him and so she doesn't go with him, but what's waiting for her on the medical floor is unlike anything she could begin to imagine. She heads into a room to find the corpse of a woman, and when she touches her body, she's pulled into a dream like experience and forced to live inside the memory that the Mara have created for the woman to drag her to them. What she's just beginning to learn, however, is that she's different. She can fight back against the monsters. She just doesn't know how to.

Something I really liked about Cole, is even when she's lost to herself in the book, she's still able to remember that she just wants to help people. I felt like I was reading this in a haze, and I imagine that's how she felt as well. I both liked and disliked that aspect of it. Will I read the next book in the trilogy? If I can get my hands on it, I most likely would. But would I seek it out? I'm not sure. That's just my opinion on the matter though. I really did think it was super unique, and I'm interested in seeing what happens next, but I'm just not in a huge rush to run out and grab it. I think if you liked Annihilation, you might like this, too.

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I was not able to open the file for this book, so I am not able to leave feedback. I apologize. I try to be very conscientious about responding to my eARCs, so this would not have happened except that I could not open the file.

This was a middle-of-the-road read for me. While I liked a lot of aspects, there were some things I disliked, and overall, I just didn't feel strongly enough about the book to really warrant adding an in-depth review to the blog.

When I first read the plot for this book I had high expectations on the whole story, but unfortunately as I read this I didn't find this as good as I thought.
The story has a lot of potential definetly, and as an excuse I'll say that I probably read it in the wrong moment when I wasn't on the right mood to read this book. I find it boring when it was supposed to be exciting, but I'm not giving up on this, as soon as I'll have time I'll read it again, hopefully I'll appreciate it more.

Blind the Eyes is a very unique book and one that requires a lot of patience. I was quite confused throughout the entire book up until the last 75% or so. There are many odd things happening to our lead gal and it's difficult to determine what is actually happened, what might just be her perception or imagination. It's the problem (and yet fun) of an unreliable narrator.

Plot
Like I said above don't expect to really follow along with much. What you will know quickly is that there is a gal and she is trying to figure out how to function under the regime of a dystopian society. It is not nearly as clear-cut as she wants it to be. There are people 'helping' her; yet she is never sure who is helping and who is tricking her. Hence as the reader we are never sure who or what is happening.

Imagery
K.A. Wiggins has done a good job of creating imagery that allows us to perceive the world the same way our lead gal does. As Blind the Eyes is written in first person we only get as much information as our lead gal is able to provide. If she can't see then we can't see. If she's confused then so are we (which is a lot of the time!). What we do get descriptions of are the smells, touch feelings and visuals of what our heroine experiences. It kind of reminded of being in a bit of a drug fog. From lost time to being uncertain on who is even speaking there is a trippy confusion throughout.

The Ending
It's very rare I stick with a book this convoluted until the end. In the case of Blind the Eyes I really wanted to know what was happening. Almost every chapter I had a different theory of what was transpiring. From wondering if our gal had a major mental illness to her being drugged 24/7 to her being unable to interpret her surrounds (maybe like someone autistic...) to magical powers to some sort of telepathy or telekinesis to her just being unable to perceive the world and then all the way back to the first theory I had which was that our lead gal was just being lied to by those in power.
I'm obviously not going to tell you what, if any of my guesses above, are correct. What I will say is that it makes perfect sense at the end. One of my personal pet peeves with books are convenient or illogical endings. Blind the Eyes had neither of these and I felt very rewarded when I flipped the last page.

Overall
This is not an easy book. But it is quite clever. I think if I were to read it again I would pick-up on many of the things that weren't clear to me on first read. If there are small inconsistencies then my mind overlooked them out of desire to plow forward and find out what on earth was going on!
After I finished Blind the Eyes I realized that Wiggins has written her story in the way that I wish Carnaval (which I hated) was put together. Sometimes it's appropriate for the reader to drift lost for awhile. So long as the hook is good enough to keep them reading it's okay. I nearly gave up twice and for that reason I give this four stars instead of five. That said, bring on book two ASAP please!

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley and Voracious Readers. This is an honest and unbiased review.

First of all, I like the concept of the book. There is special twist to YA dystopian story. That makes an ending and last scenes quite good.
I can also see the metaphor for a world where evil force can easily take Your dreams and certain people who can inspire You to chase them. I really like that.
Apart from that I have mixed feelings.
It reminds me “Hunger games” but with poorer planning and character building.
The second part, or maybe last 1/3 is much better than the beginning - just because of messy character building.
Author couldn’t avoid exaltation. I got that feeling that not only main character is very naive but also people around her - just to push the plot further.
Bad guy is so obviously BAD since the first appearance: he’s abusive, patronising, arrogant and on a high note in every sentence he speaks which makes me feel like he is a character from a cartoon. There is no spot for subtlety in him.
Also, main character’s fascination with death is a bit creepy. Yes, I’ve read whole book, and the sentence that “it’s not an obsession” but, well. It wasn’t presented as “not yet an obsession”. It was written as fully-developed obsession ;) Again - there was no subtlety in writing in this part. Everything was emphasised.
Basically I had that feeling that half of this book was written by a 16-year old girl, and the rest by grown up woman. But for me it’s a promise for development. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Unfortunately I did not manage to finish this book and as such cannot leave a full review. I will remark that I found the book difficult to read and overly complicated. When I picked it up I did not fully realise that this was a dystopia novel - perhaps this could be made clearer in the synopsis? and unfortunately this is not a genre that I enjoy. I do, however, believe that this could be a great novel for the right kind of reader.

A troublemaking ghost.
A devious rebel.
A stylist with a secret.
A monster-hunter who exists only in her dreams.


Okay, honestly, who wouldn't be drawn into this book by that alone?
I read this book in one sitting and the writing and story line were spectacular. Wiggins weaves words together to create stunning imagery, characters, and creatures. When you finish this book you will feel like you just woke up from a fantastical dream. I can't wait for the next book.

I really wanted to love this story because it sounded so interesting but this book just wasn't for me. I couldn't seem to connect with the characters.

I tried. I really, really tried.

Well, at least I got something out of this book: I finally experienced what it is like to realize how...unejoyable a book is by chapter one.

I remember I watched an interview on youtube once with the publisher who read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone's original transcript, and he said something that I cannot agree with more: "people used to say how much do you have to read before you know something's good? I say I think you'll know at two or three chapters".

The thing is those the world building was very good - excellent really. It was really creative and very well rounded, so I think what ruined this experience for me was the weird pacing of the story and how the events were developed. To describe that would be like when someone is trying to go through a door in a really awkward and unpleasant position - that is how the book progressed and the events were introduced. It's not just the story and events that were awkward - it's the character and their interactions as well.

I received a free copy for an honest review.

This book was just confusing!
It sounded so promising but after a quarter of the book I still didn’t get what it was about and what was happening at all. The descriptions were blurry and the reader is thrown into a imaginary world that isn’t explained in any way.

The characters weren’t relatable, the plot was confusing for me and I felt like rushing from page to page without getting to know through which story I rushed here.
Sadly I don’t like that book at all.

— I received an eARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for a honest review. Many thanks to both Netgalley and the publisher for this opportunity. —

I found this book utterly confusing. Even by the end of it, I was not able to really make sense of the story and the characters. While there was a sort of info-dump in the last 10%, this mainly led to further questions rather than a sense of how the world was set up and developed. The characters are rather one-dimensional too, which doesn’t help understand their motivations and aims either. Basically, this reads like a draft version of a story that might have potential.

Huge thank you to Snowmelt & Stumps and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to review this book!

This books was… strange to say the least. Strange and confusing and all over the place. Based on the description I had such high hopes for it, it had such potential to be great, but it fell completely flat and left me more annoyed than anything else. I almost DNF’d at about 40% but I pushed myself to finish it and I kind of wish I hadn’t bothered.

Full (spoiler-y) review here: http://wmsreads.tumblr.com/post/181413081787/

another one I am mildly disappointed in? it wasn't terrible or anything, I felt that the writing was great, however, the story just didn't captivate me and it didn't hold my attention. Perhaps I will give it another go when I can fully devote myself to it? However, I would recommend this for people who love POTO.