Mystic City

Mystic City by Theo Lawrence

I just finished the book. An amazon summary so I can process my reactions.

"Aria Rose, youngest scion of one of Mystic City's two ruling rival families, finds herself betrothed to Thomas Foster, the son of her parents' sworn enemies. The union of the two will end the generations-long political feud—and unite all those living in the Aeries, the privileged upper reaches of the city, against the banished mystics who dwell below in the Depths. But Aria doesn't remember falling in love with Thomas; in fact, she wakes one day with huge gaps in her memory. And she can't conceive why her parents would have agreed to unite with the Fosters in the first place. Only when Aria meets Hunter, a gorgeous rebel mystic from the Depths, does she start to have glimmers of recollection—and to understand that he holds the key to unlocking her past. The choices she makes can save or doom the city—including herself." Amazon Link

AHHHHHH IT WAS SOOOOO GOOD. Not only was it all, "HOLY CRAP ROMANCE. EVERYWHERE. WELL, ROMANCE WITH A HINT OF AMNESIA BUT WHATEVER" but it also had fantasy elements to it and oh my goodness. Just OH MY GOODNESS.

So first, the setting. Mystic City takes place in future Manhattan. The world has been crapped on by global warming and the Earth is slowly being flooded. I am under the impression that a lot of cities are now like Venice in the sense that they have channels of water between all their buildings and just everywhere. I'm assuming it takes place like fifty or so years from now, but to my knowledge they never stuck a year on the story. But that's okay.

So Manhattan has been split into two by the ruling families of the Fosters and the Roses. Their giant political families and it sounds startling like Romeo and Juliet. I want to talk about that.

So for those of you who don't know, Romeo and Juliet is a famous tragic love story that centers around two warring families; the Montagues and the Capulets. Romeo falls in love with Juliet, and they meet in secret as Juliet falls in love with Romeo. A bunch of horrible things happen and they eventually agree to meet and run away together. Juliet fakes her death in order to escape her family, and Romeo actually thinks she's dead, goes to her body, cries a bunch, and poisons himself dead. Juliet wakes up all LOL JK NOT DEAD, ....ROMEO???? and is all WOE IS ME and stabs herself with Romeo's dagger.

...let's just hope Aria doesn't wind up like Juliet.
...no really. That should not happen.

When Aria is still like, "Oh my god amnesia, what can't I remember" she discovers love letters in her drawer. One of them compares Aria and her lover to Romeo and Juliet and all the ones after that refers to them as "R." and "J." That, that makes me want to just gag. Just gag on everything. WHY, why would you want to be compared to lovers that kill themselves? It's not romantic, it's just a lot of suicide. First lover: "I CAN'T BE WITH YOU *murders self*". Second lover: "WHAT? YOU'RE DEAD? *murders self*" First lover: "LOL, I FAKED DEATH. WAIT, YOUR FOR REAL REAL DEAD? NOOOOOOOOO. I'LL MURDER MYSELF FOR REAL THIS TIME. I PROM PROM *murders self better*."

Really? Just, really?

Anyways.

When Aria is introduced, it's instantly known that she's lost her memories, engaged to Thomas Foster (in an effort to bring peace amongst their families that have mobster tendencies), and appears to have overdosed from Stic. Stic is a drug derived from the mystic's energies.

I might have just lost you. Um, okay back tracking.

This is a slight spoiler that I wish I had known MUCH MUCH sooner in the book. Mystics are humans with extra gifts; they have a sort of energy that courses through them that can be harnessed to do things. The non-mystic humans harvest that energy to fuel their city. Their energy can also be taken and made into a drug that is supposedly awesome but can kill you. Like burst into flames kill you. So, don't do that. Anyways, the mystics made themselves known to the world when USA President Truman was in office and helped to build major cities. Now they're treated like second class citizens, are required to register to get their energy harvested twice a year (which is incredibly painful and life-draining, literally), and live in a really crappy place.

The mystics are really cool and kind of mysterious and there's just a bunch of different things that get played into that in a neat way.

Moving on.

Aria is like, "Why can't I remember Thomas at all? What's happening?" and everyone is like, "Oh...I bet it's a side effect of you overdosing on Stic". She's like "Ohh....why can't I remember Thomas at all? What's happening?" but it's cool because she's not too dumb to live for long.

The whole plot of the book is kind of complicated (I stress kind of) and slowly unfolds and reveals itself. There are definitely moments where I wish I could have smacked Aria for being a bit clumsy with her mystery solving abilities, but there are other moments where I'm like, "Now she was just too smart right there." However, that didn't spoil the story for me oddly enough.

The technology of the world is interesting and all aptly named, most the explanations are pretty straight forward so it makes the book an easy and fast read.

I enjoyed Mystic City and from my understanding is that it's the first book in a trilogy. I would definitely like to read more.


Sorry this wasn't technically posted on December 8th, but I was very close dang it. I got delayed by watching The Dark Knight Rises; no one can fault me for that. ...NO ONE.

Happy reading!