Bloody Bookaholic: Review: Icons (ICONS #1) by Margaret Stohl

Title: ICONS
Author: Margaret Stohl
Series: Icons
Book #: 1
Pages: 428
Reading Level: YA
Book Rating: Photobucket

Goodreads Rating: 3.60
Published: May 7th, 2013

Your heart beats only with their permission.

Everything changed on The Day. The day the windows shattered. The day the power stopped. The day Dol's family dropped dead. The day Earth lost a war it didn't know it was fighting.

Since then, Dol has lived a simple life in the countryside -- safe from the shadow of the Icon and its terrifying power. Hiding from the one truth she can't avoid.

She's different. She survived. Why?

When Dol and her best friend, Ro, are captured and taken to the Embassy, off the coast of the sprawling metropolis once known as the City of Angels, they find only more questions. While Ro and fellow hostage Tima rage against their captors, Dol finds herself drawn to Lucas, the Ambassador's privileged son. But the four teens are more alike than they might think, and the timing of their meeting isn't a coincidence. It's a conspiracy.

Within the Icon's reach, Dol, Ro, Tima, and Lucas discover that their uncontrollable emotions -- which they've always thought to be their greatest weaknesses -- may actually be their greatest strengths.

Bestselling author Margaret Stohl delivers the first book in a heart-pounding series set in a haunting new world where four teens must piece together the mysteries of their pasts -- in order to save the future.

Taschima's POV:

Icons was a book I was excited for, and I really wanted to like, not because the author wrote Beautiful Creatures (still haven't finished that series) but because of the premise, and let's be honest a little bit because of the cover (I think it looks sick, if that is still a word being used). What ended up happening is that I has to make myself sit down in order to finish it. The beginning was exciting, and held a lot of promise, but once the story was past that first rush of excitement... it kind of lagged. A lot. I was so bored I put the book down and didn't come back for days. Not only that, but at times it was a little confusing and hard to believe.

Dol and Ro are survivors of The Day. When they were babies aliens hijacked the planet and killed every one on site. They are able to chemically kill people through frequencies and such. Everybody but these two kids. They live in a mountain somewhere until they suddenly, and unexpectedly, get attacked by the Ambassador and are abducted/dragged back to the city's headquarters were they (surprise!) find that they aren't the only two kids to have survived. There are two more, Tima and Lucas, and together they must uncover the secrets of their survival, their special powers (some very weird and confusing powers) and the secret of how to control their hormones. Good luck to them, specially on that last one.

First off, I didn't connect with the main character. She was just so, blah, and unfocused. Her "ability" is that she knows how everybody feels around her, which to me seems like a pretty kick ass ability, but she seriously doesn't know how to control it. Not only that, but she is so clueless about how people around her feel/are that you would think her ability wasn't even there. That or that it is essentially a joke. I certainly don't see what Ro, or Lucas, see in her. Yes, there is a love triangle, and not one I enjoyed or justified. Sometimes I do enjoy a good love triangle.

Just, not this time.

Ro I can understand. He is a very ill tempered guy who has been Dol's childhood friend. But, I don't think I know Ro very well. At first he seemed this mild mannered technological dude, then all of a sudden 360 change occurs and he is this HULK guy with a temper. Oookay. Lucas on the other hand was the guy we were SUPPOSED to fall in love with, but all I can say is that I REALLY disliked him. He is kind of a jerk and not the kind of jerk Damon (Vampire Diaries) can be (swoon anybody?) but the kind of jerk you wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole.

Exhibit A:

"A shadow passes over Luca's face.
"Fine."
"Don't say that, Lucas. It's not fine. I can feel it, remember?"
"I felt close to you. I wanted to make you feel better. If you don't want to feel better, that's your choice." Lucas tosses my binding at me. He's angry.

Excuse me? Talk about pressuring a girl! Not only that, but being a total jerk about it!

Exhibit B:

"I stare at him, confused. "Isn't that the point? Why we're here?""Are you really that—""What, Lucas?"

"Stupid?"

Though, really, who can blame the guy for making that conclusion? Because every time Dolores is close to this guy that is exactly what she acts like, following him around with puppy eyes and hanging on his every word.

"Kissing Lucas is like kissing a kiss itself. There's no way to explain it any better than that. And I don't even want to try."

That is the LAMEST way ever to describe a first kiss. Kissing this guy is like kissing a kiss itself?

If this is the kind of writing we can expect for the rest of the series, kill me now.

Now Tima, the rebellious "bitch" of the series is actually 10 times more interesting than Dolores! She has spunk, and turned out to be a major babe with brains! Thanks to her they manage to find out a bunch of different things from the ambassador, without her even knowing it. Girl got some serious skills. She can be terrifying true, and a little moody, but she doesn't bore.

Yes, I am going to continue reading the series. The story does have potential for greatness, and maybe this first book was just a mild bump in the road to said greatness. I am interested in the said "lords" that rule over the planet from a back curtain. I am interested to meet CAP Miyazawa (the human ~~ruler~~ administrator of all). There were a lot of bread crumbs left in the story to hook you in order for you to keep reading. So I am holding hope that the second one is more alive than the first.