Book Review: Captive Rebel

Title: Captive Rebel
Author: Erin McDermott
Rating: 3/5
Series: The Allegiance (Book 1)

Captive Rebel is a mix between dystopian and action with some romance sprinkled in, and it was pretty good! The main character, Marylyn O'Conner, starts of with this this go-with-the-flow personality that gets her into a few spots of trouble, but turns into this tough, strong character after she is captured. I love protagonists with spines (it's a pet peeve of mine when they don't), and every time she reminded her captors that she had a name I did an internal backflip. I also loved the fact that she was honest and didn't let people try and sugar-coat the situation, since it made me like her a lot more.

Honestly, my biggest complaint is that I wanted more. I would have loved to hear the backstory behind the division between the rebels and the Allegiant, what the wars were, and where the United States went. What was Ian's deal, how did they pick Charles, Ian, and Marylyn for the mission, I just have questions. One of the things that I look for in a book is for it to make me want more answers, to know more, and Captive Rebel definitely achieved that.

LIKES:
+ Marylyn's transformation, because she went from "whatever you say" to "I'll do it myself." I really liked how she figured out that some things she just had to take into her own hands, and I definitely liked captured Marylyn better than pre-capture Marylyn.
+ Marylyn's spine, as explained above
+ The Greek mythology ties, because I was interested enough that I had to go Google some stuff, and that means I have to find some books on Greek mythology and start reading
+ Marylyn's constant worrying actually made it easier to relate to her, because she was worrying about everything and I was worrying about everything, and we were able to worry together!
+ The character of Fanny was really well written. 3 words into her dialogue and I already hated her, which I'm pretty sure was the intent. Charles was really well written as well, I felt like his actions and the writing really fit with his character.

DISLIKES:
- I really would have liked to see more backstory, and some explanations regarding the wars, temples, Ian, the mission, etc. That was my main complaint, I just felt like I needed more of the story.
- There were a couple grammatical errors (I say this as my computer spell-checks grammatical for me because I can't spell, nor can I use commas) that didn't necessarily detract from the story but interrupted my flow a little. Also, as a fan of longer (and, as others describe them, flowery) sentences, I would have liked to see more of those.
- I felt like the pacing was a little too fast, but I think this relates back to the wanting-more-backstory thing. That would help slow the pacing, draw the story out, and make it not feel as rushed.
- Overprotective Ariston because I have issues with overprotective romance but that's probably just me.

I can honestly say that this was one of the few romance-type novels that I actually approved of the amount of romance included. Normally the romance overpowers the rest of the book, but this was actually more action and then a few romance scenes sprinkled in, but nothing that made me want to skip 5 pages ahead like I've had to do in some books. I liked this book, but I feel like I could have liked it more had it been more fleshed out.


Disclaimer: I was contacted by the author and asked to read and review this book. This has in no way impacted or altered my review, which is solely based on my feelings toward this book and its content. I did not receive any compensation (monetary or material) for this review and procured a copy of the book on my own.

See this review on Goodreads.