Summary: Teva goes to school, studies for her exams, and spends time with her friends. To the rest of the world, she’s a normal teenager. But when she goes home, she’s anything but normal. Due to a genetic abnormality, Teva unwillingly clones herself every year. And lately, home has become a battleground. When boys are at stake, friends are lost, and lives are snatched away, Teva has a fight on her hands—a fight with herself. As her birthday rolls around, Teva is all too aware that time is running out. She knows that the next clone will soon seize everything she holds dear. Desperate to hang on to her life, Teva decides to find out more about her past . . . and uncovers lies that could either destroy her or set her free. (Pub Date: Jun 13, 2017)
Honest review based on an ARC provided by Netgalley. Many thanks to the publisher for this opportunity.
This was truly entertaining.
If you're a Doctor Who fan, imagine if he were a teenager girl and his regenerations actually allowed his older self to coexist with the new one. For Teva, this replication happens every year. And only the oldest one is allowed to use the Teva name and live her life while her "sisters" need to stay at home, hidden from anyone.
As I'm mentioning Doctor Who, while I could never call this a cliché, I can't say this was all too original, either. To be honest the bickering between current Teva and her fifteen-year-old self even reminded me of Ten and Tentoo—and of whenever regenerations meet in special episodes. Still, cloning not a theme I have seen explored in YA fiction, much less to this extent.
Teva has two big dilemmas to deal with: she needs to take over someone else's life she feels is her own but she also acknowledges it really isn't—as with anyone growing older, our personalities also change as we mature. The second dilemma is exactly the next Teva, she can feel her under the skin, gradually forming and getting stronger. She won't really die in a year but she'll be locked inside the house with her other selves, which is almost the same.
And she notices there is a third problem. Because her mother is so afraid of others finding out and taking her daughters to a lab, she hasn't allowed Teva to tell a soul—not even her best friend or her boyfriend. What if her copies aren't real, then? Funnily, whenever such an idea occurs, that's the one we hope against. For this book, I saw this ending as the happy one so hopeless I considered Teva's predicament.
But this YA doesn't run too deep. To be honest, I prefer it this way. I liked the mess that was Teva's relationship with the others I kept picturing how this story would ideal for a TV series. The plot does thicken, don't get me wrong, but it isn't the focus. This is really a lighthearted story about a teenager between her former selves and her future self—in a far-from-ordinary manner. Most of the story could have worked for siblings really close in age, for example. And I would still have liked it.
This is a fun read that will have you turning pages, worrying for poor Teva. There are also many themes here ideal for group discussions, as well as a mystery. It could have been more but it's still really good as is. Definitely, one of my favorite YA's of 2017.
Rating: 4 out of 5.
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