Review – Gone (Wake, Book 3) by Lisa McMann (3/5 stars)
This is the final book in the Wake
Janie and Caleb are trying to have a normal relationship despite Janie’s degenerating eye sight and Dream Walking skills. But Caleb’s dreams show Janie that he is having trouble coping. When Janie gets a call that her mom is in the hospital she wonders what her irresponsible drunk mother has done this time. When she gets to the hospital what she finds is not what she expected. Her mother didn’t do anything at all, her mother got a call that Janie’s father is dying and is in a coma. Janie never knew her father and, as she stumbles into her father’s terrifying dreams, she hopes to find a way to help him and maybe help herself. The time is getting close when Janie has to decide either to use her dream walking skills and go blind in her twenties, or choose to isolate herself from all of humanity.
The writing for this book was much like the previous books. The sentences are short without much description; they really propel the book forward. The chapters are done by day of the week and then broken down into further sections by time; just like the previous books.
What this book lacks overall is a really gripping plot. In previous books Janie has always had a life or death mystery to solve, something scary and mysterious. This book wasn’t like that. Most of the book centers around Janie’s struggle to decide if she will leave Caleb and isolate herself, as well as how Janie struggles with her alcoholic mother. There is some mystery around her dad’s past that she works to resolve, and while this part of the book is interesting, it isn’t as engaging as the previous books were.
Janie seemed more whiny in this book to me. She spends a lot of time whining about how much her life sucks; which is does suck, but it could be worse. She also spends a lot of time not communicating with anyone around her and this makes everything worse for her. I thought this book made Janie come off as a bit more dense than previous books.
This book is, again, very short…took maybe an hour and a half to read. I was disappointed that it dealt with so little and had been hoping for another death-defying mystery for Janie to solve. As far as the ending itself it concludes the major plot points in a way that won’t piss anyone off.
Overall it was an okay read. I expected something scarier and edgier, but it didn’t deliver that. It delivers a somewhat engaging mystery and a conclusion to Janie’s story. Will I read more books by McMann? Probably not. The premise for this series was creative but I didn’t enjoy her writing style a ton and the books are very short for what you pay for.
This book went towards the following reading challenges:
– The Young Adult Reading Challenge
– The 100+ Book Reading Challenge
– Support Your Local Library Reading Challenge
