Slated by Teri Terry

Slated by Teri Terry
Synopsis:
Kyla’s memory has been erased,
her personality wiped blank,
her memories lost for ever.
She’s been Slated.
The government claims she was a terrorist and that they are giving her a second chance - as long as she plays by their rules. But echoes of the past whisper in Kyla’s mind. Someone is lying to her, and nothing is as it seems. Who can she trust in her search for the truth?

Slated is very different from any other dystopian I have read as it is set not that far in the future with a world similar to our own. From the moment I read the synopsis I found the whole concept of the story intriguing, I could easily see something like slating, wiping a criminal’s memories, happening in the future and that's what really made this book interesting.

Kyla, the main character, is a unique narrator as we don’t know anything about her and neither does she, and as the reader you are left wondering who she is and what she must have done to been slated. She is very intelligent and observant but at times she can be almost childlike as the world and everything in it is new to her. As she had been slated, she has no memories of her past – or doesn’t to being with – but she does have a distinct personality that makes her a very interesting character to read. She is completely different to the other slateds in the book and as the story goes on she begins to get whispers of her memories back she becomes even more intriguing and complex.

The romance in the book was a very minimal part of the story that didn’t interest me at all, I just didn’t feel there was any chemistry between the two characters. Ben, the love interest, was also slated but I couldn’t take to his character at all and compared to Kyla his lack of personality bored me. Aside from the romance the other thing that I had a problem with was that the number of questions I had weren't answered by the end of the book, we only know what Kyla knows, and because of this we don’t know why she was slated, why she is remembering things and we don’t know much about the world. So even though I whizzed through this book really enjoying it the ending was a little disappointing and didn’t do justice to the story.

The world being similar to our own makes the book a whole lot more frightening and very believable. The whole story is creepy and mysterious but at the same time fascinating and the regular visions and dreams Kyla has of her past life adds to the mystery factor.

Slated is a thought provoking novel with a very intriguing plot making it a very interesting page-turner, I didn’t find this book particularly mind blowing even though it had the potential to be but I still enjoyed it nonetheless and I love the whole concept of the story.