Actual rating - 1.6/5

Pros
- The kids begin to rebel against the ymbrynes and we see how their method of ruling is becoming less effective. I hope this turns into peculiardom changing the way it governs. I would hope that the children will have more of a say on what happens. It has the potential to create a deeply layered conflict and add independence to these characters.

- I do like the direction this new story is going with the whole "7 children are the future" blah blah blah thing. I hope we get a huge expansion of that in the next book.

Cons
- The subplot with Leo came on so jarringly and made absolutely zero sense. The shift in plot was so confusing, I thought I had missed some pages. Even the POV it's written in is different.

- We don't spend time with or bond with H nearly enough to have his death be impactful in anyway. If he was involved more and Jacob formed more of a relationship with him, perhaps I would've cared more. His death feels like a cop out and only serves as motivation/information for Jacob.

- The characters in this book (besides Millard and Lily) are incredibly annoying, especially Jacob. These characters have no dimension and anything interesting about them has been forgotten about in this book. They all have 1 trait/serve 1 purpose. Bronwyn is strong, Enoch is annoying/mean, Emma is in love with Abe. There are no dimension/complexity to them. Not the mention, the main character Jacob is so whiny and stupid. His actions and behaviour in this book just made me want to rip my hair out. He's incredibly stubborn and careless. He didn't think things through and instead through himself and his friends head first into a suicide mission for what? How am I supposed to get behind his motivations? Has he learned nothing from the first 3 books?

- The romance between Jacob and Emma is weird and boring. It's weird that Emma fell for Jacob because of his grandfather despite saying it was different. What actual distinction has been provided for why Emma's feeling towards Jacob are different from her feelings towards Abe? Just because she says so? That's not enough. Not to mention that there's no chemistry between them. Their romance is incredibly bland and insta-lovey which I am not a fan of. Jacob just likes her because she's pretty. It needs actual substance. Riggs needs to make me believe that these characters belong together, and so far he hasn't.

- Jacob's conflict with his parents leads nowhere and takes a cop out route of wiping their memories. This plot point with Jacob's parents had the potential the create an incredibly emotional conflict within the family and actually make me feel sympathy for Jacob. But no, instead Riggs uses teenage angst and memory wiping as a cop out instead of trying to come to a proper conclusion to that conflict.

- Pacing was incredibly slow with virtually non-stop filler.

- Any of the potential villains shown were not at all fleshed out. They existed for less than a chapter and again, made no sense.

- The photos weren't even interesting in this one.