Friday, May 17, 2019

REVIEW: The Hunt by Andrew Fukuda



The Hunt (The Hunt, #1)
Don’t sweat. Don’t laugh. Don’t draw attention to yourself. And most of all, whatever you do, do not fall in love with one of them.

Gene is different from everyone else around him. He can’t run with lightning speed, sunlight doesn’t hurt him, and he doesn’t have an unquenchable lust for blood. Gene is a human, and he knows the rules. Keep the truth a secret. It’s the only way to stay alive in a world of night - a world where humans are considered a delicacy and hunted for their blood.

When he’s chosen for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hunt the last remaining humans, Gene’s carefully constructed life begins to crumble around him. He’s thrust into the path of a girl who makes him feel things he never thought possible - and into a ruthless pack of hunters whose suspicions about his true nature are growing. Now that Gene has finally found something worth fighting for, his need to survive is stronger than ever - but is it worth the cost of his humanity?





MY THOUGHTS
I originally read this book in 2012 on a night which I did not want to sleep. It wasn't because I was reading riveting books; I was staying the night at my grandma's and my OCD at the time prevented me from being comfortable sleeping in a bed not my own. So I read books all night. I read a total of three books start to finish, the other two being (Monument 14 and Embrace). The Hunt was the last of the three. I know, I know, I'm blabbing. Why am I telling you this? Because I had absolutely no memory of this book, I wasn't even sure how I felt about this book when I first read it!

Seven years later, I definitely had no memory of this book and I still needed to read the sequel. I also needed an audiobook to read and noticed that the audio for this book was available so I decided to reread this book! To be honest, I have no idea how I really feel about this book. It felt like I was reading this book for the first time. I was really curious to know what would happen to the MC, even if I suspected where it as headed, there was so much suspense throughout this book. But... I had way too many questions on how this world functioned.

The Hunt takes place in a future overrun with vampires. In fact, humans are thought to be instinct. Except, Gene is human and has been drilled on how to blend in with the vampires, and he's been doing a pretty great job so far. Then it is announced that there will be a Heper Hunt. There are a group of humans, who were raised in captivity, that a select group of vampires will get the honor of hunting. They are chosen via lottery. Gene is one of the chosen, but he has to keep himself even more on guard. Without his usual tools to keep himself, his scent hidden, without the nutrients he needs to survive, he wonders constantly how he can keep up this charade.

First of all, I need to talk about the audio. I do not recommend the audio for this book. The narrator's voice sounded like a professor in his 30's, not a teenage boy pretending to be a vampire. It kept me from getting fully in the story and he did a terrible job of changing his voice per character so I had no idea who was talking at most points. Also, the audiobook was 11 hours long! This book is only 293 pages! The narrator talked that slowly! I eventually checked out the book from the library to read the rest myself.

As I mentioned, I was invested in this book. I really wanted to know how Gene would get out of this situation and there was so much suspense in this book. The premise is also very unique in having a human masquerading as a vampire and showing a human hunt. There was a lot of thought put into the vampires themselves. What makes them different from humans and how they show "emotion", as well as how Gene could pretend to be a vampire for so long. There is enough in this book to show readers a different sort of vampire than we are used to seeing and as this was published shortly after the YA craze of romanticizing vampires, it was probably nice to read a book that showed how frightening vampires could be, from the viewpoint of a human.

Where this book lost me though was the world. I really tried to ignore the problems in the world-building, because I really liked the story, but it kept coming up. One problem I had is that Gene has a habit of making metaphors that make me question the world he lives in. At one point he compared something to kids at an amusement park which made me wonder how he knew about amusement parks. Did he read it in a book? Do they still have human books in this world? Or are there vampire amusement parks? Are there vampire kids then? Do vampires reproduce? They must if there aren't any humans left, but how did vampires appear in the first place? How did they take over? There is just not enough background to tell me about this world. I can understand some things not being answered, maybe it will come up in a sequel, but wouldn't vampires talk about how they took over the human world? And how does Gene have so much knowledge about the world before? How long ago did humans take over? I would pretend to ignore the world-building issues, but then Gene would say another metaphor or there would be a contradiction in the story.

As for Gene, I do think he made a compelling main character. By the way, I feel weird calling him Gene because for most of the book he had no name. I have complicated feelings for Gene because he wasn't always likable and he did not always make the best decisions, but he did make an interesting character. I also think that his personality is partially based on how he was raised. He's raised among entirely emotionless beings who would eat him at any opportunity if they knew he was human. He also has complicated feelings about being human. He feels ashamed of his humanity and wants to be "normal" and it's interesting seeing his viewpoint because he always feels like he has to explain his humanity. He distrusts vampires, but what was odd in the book is that he is also very quick to trust other people.

As for romance, to me, this book had no romance, but I think there was supposed to be romance. There is some attraction for Ashley June, but it does not really go anywhere. Except there was that weird armpit/elbow thing which is either the vampire equivalent to kissing or to sex. That was very strange. I was glad that there wasn't a focus on romance because I don't like it when a romance takes over and it that gave more time for the story. Although, I get the feeling that that will change in the rest of the series.



IN CONCLUSION
Overall, I feel like I'm saying more negative things than positive things. I did really like the idea behind the book and I was interested enough that I keep reading even after the horrible narration. I was curious to see how things would pan out, but I could not ignore the world-building issues and the inconsistencies in the story. I do plan on reading the sequel. The ending of this book made me curious and since I reread this one purely so I could finish this series, I feel obligated to continue.

I hereby give this book
2.5 Stars
Meaning: I almost liked it, but not quite

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