Concentr8 - William Sutcliffe

Title: Concentr8
Author: William Sutcliffe
Publisher: Bloomsbury Children's
Publication Date: Aug 27, 2015                    
Available Editions: Hardcover, EBook





Netgalley Synopsis:

In a future London, Concentr8 is a prescription drug intended to help kids with ADD. Soon every troubled teen is on it. It makes sense, doesn’t it? Keep the undesirable elements in line. Keep people like us safe from people like them. What’s good for society is good for everyone.
Troy, Femi, Lee, Karen and Blaze have been taking Concentr8 as long as they can remember. They’re not exactly a gang, but Blaze is their leader, and Troy has always been his quiet, watchful sidekick – the only one Blaze really trusts. They’re not looking for trouble, but one hot summer day, when riots break out across the city, they find it.
What makes five kids pick a man seemingly at random – a nobody, he works in the housing department, doesn’t even have a good phone – hold a knife to his side, take him to a warehouse and chain him to a radiator? They’ve got a hostage, but don’t really know what they want, or why they’ve done it. And across the course of five tense days, with a journalist, a floppy-haired mayor, a police negotiator, and the sinister face of the pharmaceutical industry, they – and we – begin to understand why.

This is a book about how we label children. It’s about how kids get lost and failed by the system. It’s about how politicians manipulate them. Gripping and controversial reading for fans of Malorie Blackman and Patrick Ness.

Review:

I was given the opportunity to read this book before its publication date in return of a honest review. Unfortunately I had to force my way through it, it simply didn't grip me at all. This book to me was really boring. I barely enjoyed it to any degree. It sounded promising and exciting but the book for me, didn't deliver. I cant even say I know where William Sutcliffe was trying to go with this book, maybe that was my fault for maybe not understanding or maybe it was written in a way it just didn't get the message.

Im not good with characters changing point of view. I would be able to handle two point of views but no more. I got confused with who was who several times. The characters were written badly, they all seemed to be the same characters except for Karen who finished every sentence with a question mark, to what seemed to be for no reason and it begun to drive me crazy. The characters spoke about pointless things and I didn't care for any of it. It was probably just to make the book longer. Unfortunately in my eyes there is nothing worth saying about the characters.

The story lacked excitement, things didn't seem to flow smoothly and even though things were happening, it felt like literally nothing was. It was so boring to read but I forced my way through it. The ending was okay and there's not much I can really say. I didn't really care for what happened and slightly predictable, I only didn't care because I thought they lacked any sort of emotion to connect to me with.

There's not much I can really say. I have never read a book by him before so I don't know what his writing style is, but part of me was expecting a lot from the book. The little parts at the start of the chapters were interesting but they didn't feel like they fitted there or even belonged in the book, it felt like they were used to add some sort of length to the book.

I cant say I'd recommend this book to anyone. Depending on the books plot I'm not sure if I can read another book by William Sutcliffe. It makes me sad to say I can only give this book a 1 out of 5, it just simply didn't do anything for me.