Another pair of lovers in a post-apocalyptic dystopia fight the Man.
When Rachel's father, Jared, the best tracker in Baalboden, doesn't return from a mission, he is declared dead, and his teenage apprentice, Logan, is unexpectedly named her Protector. This is a problem, because she hates his guts. But they both loved Jared, and they are both determined to defy the megalomaniacal Commander that rules their city-state to find him. Readers will be frustrated at the textbook way Rachel and Logan fail to communicate with each other, as each plots separately to escape into the Wasteland and find Jared. Predictably, they are found out, and just as predictably, they discover passionate love for each other. Redwine's worldbuilding is particularly weak. Vague reference is made to an energy shortage that led to drilling that woke up the Cursed One, a reptilian monster that lives underground, but there is no attempt to flesh out the catastrophe that destroyed civilization as we know it. How women came to be relegated to positions of extreme subservience is also left completely unexplained. That all of this seems to have happened within the lifetime of the Commander who founded Baalboden beggars credulity. Internal logic takes a backseat to overwrought, present-tense narration, which alternates between Logan's and Rachel's nearly identical voices.
Only for those who can't get enough of this nearly played-out genre. (Dystopian romance. 13 & up)
