Books I've Read: I Hope You Get this Message

I picked this one up at the library because it sounded interesting.  I always like a ook with a ticking clock, and what ticks louder than a potential alien planet promising to destroy the world?  But to be honest, that part of the story is fairly minor in this book.  It's very much in the background and influences the eahviour of the charaters and those around them, but it isn't delved into in any great detail.

The three main characters are very different.  Cate is super responsible and together because she's grown up with a single mother who suffers from mental illness.  She knows very little about her father, but when, in a manic episode, her mother tells her to take a letter to him, Cate is determined to do just that.

Jesse also lives with a single mother who works her ass off to keep herself and her son afloat.  With money so tight, Jesse has taken to stealing so they have enough to eat and does whatever he can to bring in any extra cash.  So, when news of the alien invasion hits, he figures out a way to use the ensuing gpanic to his advantage.

And finally, Adeem is a crack computer programmer whose life was shattered when his sister came out and then ran away when their parents wouldn't accept it.  He can't forgive her for this and with the clock counting down to the end of the world, he's desperate to see her again.

Over the course of this book and these three distinct missions, the three characters collide and discover truths about themselves and those they love they would never have expected.

I aways find in books with multiple protagonists, there's one I like more than the others and in this book it was Jesse.  I found Cate annoying in many ways, especially in the way she treated her best friend.  And while I didnt have any real problem with Adeem, I didn't have an enormous amount of love for him either.

But the book isn't bad.  I liked that in a story about an alien threat, the place everyone was trying to get to was Roswell.  And that Roswell ended up having the answers they were looking for, even if they didn;t have anything to do with aliens.

So, while this book didn't really rock my world, it was a decent enough read.

But don;t just listen to me.  Here's the blurb:


Seven days. Seven days. The Earth might end in seven days.

When news stations start reporting that Earth has been contacted by a planet named Alma, the world is abuzz with rumors that the alien entity is giving mankind only few days to live before they hit the kill switch on civilization.

For high school truant Jesse Hewitt, though, nothing has ever felt permanent. Not the guys he hooks up with. Not the jobs his underpaid mom works so hard to hold down. Life has dealt him one bad blow after another — so what does it matter if it all ends now? Cate Collins, on the other hand, is desperate to use this time to find the father she’s never met, the man she grew up hearing wild stories about, most of which she didn’t believe. And then there’s Adeem Khan. While coding and computer programming have always come easily to him, forgiveness doesn’t. He can’t seem to forgive his sister for leaving, even though it’s his last chance.

With only seven days to face their truths and right their wrongs, Jesse, Cate, and Adeem’s paths collide even as their worlds are pulled apart.