Firstlife by Gena Showalter (2016)

Ten had been in captivity for more than a year. Her crime: not signing on to an afterlife. In her world, life is just the first step in existence. During the firstlife one must choose and sign a contract with either Troika or Myriad. With Myriad, actions, successes, and social status mean everything, and can either make or break you. Both of Ten’s parents have already signed on to Myriad, but both of their contacts depends on if also Ten will sign. On the other side there’s Troika, a realm that treats everyone fairly and with respect that is dependent of citizens following laws. Not ready to make a decision, Ten’s parents have put her in a type of chosen prison, where she experiences torture daily, pressuring her to make a decision. To help her comes Killian from Myriad and Archer from Troika, who soon realize that persuading Ten is more than just a job.  After quickly breaking out of confinement, Ten, Archer, and Killian enter the battleground of the outside world, where the realms are will to do anything, including killing her, to keep her from siding with the opposite realm.

Let me just start off by saying that this is possibly the most original book I have ever read. I feel like the concept of an afterlife has been used so much, but never like this. At least in my reading, I’ve never come across another book that discusses the possibility of actually choosing an afterlife. This was also the first time I’ve seen the afterlife looked at in science fiction, compared to in the paranormal genre, where it’s everywhere. I also really enjoyed how the afterlife piece was framed in a really understandable and realistic way (if the afterlife can be realistic).

Firstlife is huge. Like, 400+ pages huge. And, throughout the whole thing, I never got bored. There was so much adventure in this book. Ten, Archer, and Killian traveled around the whole world, going to so many different landscapes, which all brought their own set of adventures. Usually, I don’t get this much action from a whole entire series. That being said, the plot is pretty fast paced. For the most part, I didn’t mind, but there were some parts where everything happened so fast it became very confusing as to what was going. This especially happened near the end, where it felt way too rushed. As long as it was, Firstlife could’ve probably used another 50 pages, or even done well with the book split in two.

I had some problems with Ten’s voice. Unfortunately, I felt that Gena Showalter’s voice, who is way older than Ten, shine through. Ten’s thoughts and conversations seemed like they were trying to mimic a teenager’s voice, but didn’t quite succeed. I hate to say it, but I really thought Ten was selfish. I get it: she had a really huge decision that would affect her life in an extreme way, and there’s ought to be tension with that. However, it seemed that she had a pretty clear idea of what she was going to choose since the beginning, and I really didn’t see any point on why she wouldn’t decide. I also was not a huge fan of Killian, who was extremely arrogant. He depended way too much on his looks to get him to higher places, and could not go five seconds without bringing up sex. But, he did go through a lot of character growth. Yes, he was still arrogant at the end, but a lot less that at the beginning. So, obviously, my favorite character was Archer. I really liked how much he respected Ten, and gave her space whenever she requested it. In general, he was also just a really nice guy who had everybody’s best interest at heart.

Overall, the concept of Firstlife really saved the story for me, since it definitely had some flaws. Hopefully, I’ll be picking the next one up soon.

3 Stars