The Taking
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4.8 • 4 Ratings
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer meets The Fifth Wave in this chilling and explosive new series from author Kimberly Derting.
The last thing Kyra Agnew remembers is a flash of bright light. She awakes to discover that five whole years have passed. Everyone in her life has moved on—her parents are divorced, her boyfriend is in college and dating her best friend—but Kyra's still the sixteen-year-old she was when she vanished. She finds herself drawn to Tyler, her boyfriend's kid brother, despite her best efforts to ignore this growing attraction. In order to find out the truth, the two of them decide to retrace her steps from that fateful night. They discover that there are others who have been "taken," just like Kyra. But Kyra is the first person to have been returned past the forty-eight-hour taken mark. With a determined secret government agency after her, Kyra desperately tries to find an explanation and reclaim the life she once had . . . but what if the life she wants back is not her own?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After 16-year-old Kyra stalks off one night, there's a flash of light, and she awakens to discover that five years have passed without her in this engrossing paranormal romance. Kyra's conversational, occasionally sarcastic first-person voice redeems an otherwise slow first half as Derting dwells on Kyra's resentment of the changes that occurred in her absence, including the two-year-old half-brother she now has and her former boyfriend's new relationship. But Kyra finds a stubbornly loyal, supportive partner in her ex's younger brother, the nerdy, playful Tyler. Meanwhile, she tries to avoid the NSA agent stalking her. Encountering her pursuer, "I stammered, because sometimes when I was intimidated, I was smooth like that." Tension intensifies when Kyra learns she isn't the only one who's been "taken." Derting (The Pledge) turns a hoary alien-abduction conspiracy theory into an original and intriguing premise. Though it's difficult to suspend disbelief when no one explains to Kyra why she's dangerous until it's too late, any pacing problems disappear as the book hurtles toward a high-stakes finish, and a cliffhanger sets up the next installment of this trilogy. Ages 14 up.
