Mind Games

Author: Kierstan White
Goodreads Rating: 3.98
Pages: 256
Format: ARC from NYCC12

Fia was born with flawless instincts. Her first impulse, her gut feeling, is always exactly right. Her sister, Annie, is blind to the world around her—except when her mind is gripped by strange visions of the future.

Trapped in a school that uses girls with extraordinary powers as tools for corporate espionage, Annie and Fia are forced to choose over and over between using their abilities in twisted, unthinkable ways… or risking each other’s lives by refusing to obey.

In a stunning departure from her New York Times bestselling Paranormalcy trilogy, Kiersten White delivers a slick, edgy, heartstoppingly intense psychological thriller about two sisters determined to protect each other—no matter the cost.

I really enjoyed this book. It was the first book by White that I have ever read and I found that I liked it a lot. The idea was original and the characters were all wonderfully developed. My only complaint was that it was a little short and I wish there has been a little more in the way of describing the high action scenes, which there were so many of. Even now as I’m trying to come up with things to talk about this book, there are just so many.

The way that this story is told is through both flashback and shots of what is currently happening. The book only takes place over the last 2 days, but White uses flashback from various points of the last 7 years to show how these two sisters got to where they were. I found this technique really effective as I puzzled out what was going on and why they were in this predicament. We are first introduced to Fia who seems to be dangerous and broken. Really, you just want to fix everything that is wrong with her and give her a real chance at life, but alas, she is stuck where she is. I think that Fia showed a lot of signs that she had PTSD, and it just makes you more angry at the people that put her in this position. Even though Fia is really sad and broken, I quite liked her and rooted for her to do well. She was funny in parts in her attempt to thwart the Seers and Feelers that controlled her life.

I did not like Annie, Fia’s sister. I felt that although she clearly loved Fia, she did nothing good for her. Every time Annie tried to do something that she thought helped, she only managed to make the situation worse for Fia. Even if she tried to be selfless, she really was just a selfish person who was just made more problems for her sister. Even as you look back into the flashbacks, it is clear that Annie was more trouble than Fia. I admired both of their willingness to go down for one another.

I really liked James too even though he was a lot older than Fia. I think the hardest part of this book was trying to figure out everyone’s ages in proximity to one another. We were given clues like that James was in college when Fia was 14 and that there was an incident with a puzzle when Fia was 5 and Annie was 7. Eventually it was easy to figure out how everyone related to the other. I liked that even after so many hard years, Fia was still compassionate for helping people she didn’t know. She could have very easily have let people die, but instead, she fought to keep herself human and from spiraling into a mess like she had before.

I’m looking forward to the next book because Fia and Annie were sneaky and clever as they tried to outsmart the system. I’m eager to see what Keane is really trying to do with an army of Seers and Feelers. There are so many details that I can’t wait to see come out as we learn more about the relationship between the sisters and how everything is going to turn out in the end.

The Courts Decision: