That was... fine.
Not gonna lie, this one is pretty underwhelming after hearing about all that critical praise.

First of all, let me list the good things. It's pretty well-written, the pacing is appropriate, and I really like the slow reveal throughout the book of the world they live in. It's a very refreshing and original approach to the dystopian genre, telling it through the lens of a coming-of-age story. Additionally, SpoilerKathy and Tommy have great chemistry and are quite likeable in general.

Now, the bad things. Dystopian themes aside, this book just felt like a generic coming-of-age story with a Spoilerlove triangle at its center. The ideas introduced near the beginning of the novel are intriguing and can make for a pretty great story, but they just never do much with it. Eventually the book gets repetitive really fast and with that I find it really hard to care about the characters. SpoilerRuth in particular is such a self-centered and manipulative monster of a person and it's baffling more than anything for the other two main characters to put up with her behaviour for this long. There are also repeated attempts by the novel to make the readers feel sorry for her but none of them are successful for me Spoiler(although she did redeem herself a little near the end). I also found it weird how none of the characters ever thought of escaping the place and instead just surrender and succumb to their fate. Oh, and drink every time they mention "daft" or "cross".

In the end, I understand and appreciate what this book is going for. It's more of an existential drama with no big reveal or twist with much more emphasis on the characters. I just wished that the characters are more compelling and the story delves into deeper themes and ideas, because it just felt like the book only toyed with one idea and stayed stagnant throughout the rest of it.

UPDATE: Nevermind, this book is pretty great.