Review: The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson

Title: The Adoration of Jenna Fox
Author: Mary E. Pearson
Series: Jenna Fox Chronicles #1
Publication: September 1st 2009 by Square Fish
Genre: Young Adult ~ Science Fiction
Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository | Kobo
Rating: 3/5

Everything is different

Seventeen-year-old Jenna Fox has just awoken from a year-long coma - so she's been told - and she is still recovering from the terrible accident that caused it. But what happened before that? She's been given home movies chronicling her entire life, which spark memories to surface. But are the memories really hers? And why won't anyone in her family talk about the accident? Jenna is becoming more curious. But she is also afraid of what she might find out if she ever gets up the courage to ask her questions.

What happened to Jenna Fox? And who is she really?

The Adoration of Jenna Fox was a gift from a dear friend of mine that I should've read ages ago but for some reason it got stuck sitting on my bookshelf for years waiting for me to finally pick it up. 

I really enjoyed the book in general and it was a pretty quick read. The writing style sat really well with me. So in that aspect it was totally up my alley. But that's where it sort of stopped for me. Not terribly far into the big there was a twist in the story. Unfortunately I had seen this one coming from miles away. To me it was really obvious what was going on. 

The next thing that bothered me was the romance, even though it was already very minor. I just felt like it wasn't at all necessary to the story. I just couldn't get on board with Jenna and Ethan. I thought they would've been way better as good friends. Also some of the secondary characters were too mediocre to really care about. I also don't get what the point of the character of Dane was. He just seemed irrelevant.

And then there was the ending that was super underwhelming. I just felt really disappointed with it, sadly enough. If anything it was the first half of the book that was the best, in my opinion.

I did like the message of the story, though. It was kind of thought provoking, which I think you don't find too often in these kind of stories. So that, together with the writing is what made the book worth reading.

Mary E. Pearson is the award-winning author of The Jenna Fox Chronicles, The Miles Between, A Room on Lorelei, and Scribbler of Dreams. She writes full-time from her home office in California where she lives with her husband and two golden retrievers.
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