Review: The New Agenda (The New Agenda #2) by Simone Pond

Ava's journey continues as she searches inside the mainframe to find Chief Morray. She ends up hitting his archive files, sending her way back to the early days. For certain, society was disintegrating: humans were self-destructive and wildly uncontrolled. But young William Morray had hoped, as an idealistic teenager, that his father’s acclaimed Repatterning Program––a precursor to the brilliant New Agenda––could manage the upheaval and get society back on track. They said it was for the greater good: out of chaos comes order and from the ashes the phoenix will rise. They said the Repatterning was a positive event, but like most advertising, it was a lie.

William’s wish had always been to work with his father and win his approval. However, when he is sent away to a remote underground safety shelter in Denver, William is awakened to the grisly truth that the Repatterning is a mass genocide. And worse: his father, the New Agenda leader, is the spearhead of this horrifying plan to eradicate all cities, homes and people outside of the Elite citizenship. William decides to team up with an underground rebel alliance to end the Repatterning and save what’s left of civilization.

I picked this one up immediately after I finished the first book in the series (The City Center). I really enjoyed the first installment and I had high hopes for the second ... thank goodness Simone Pond delivered!! I can think of quite a few impossibly popular series where the 2nd book was almost the kiss of death. It seems like authors write a popular novel and then when they get to the next in the series, they just totally crap on the entire thing and it leaves you wondering why you fell in love with the first novel! Anyhow ... authors: Don't do that.

Whew. Now lets get on with things ... I just loved this book. I enjoyed it quite a bit more than the first and I really, really liked that one. The funny thing is that I was speaking to the author about this second book and she said that she loved writing it. Well, you can tell. This book was intricately written with quite a few twists and turns that kept me on my toes from the very first page to the last period. 

Thankfully, the characters didn't change one iota - they were still the same as they were I left them in the first book. Although ... I did find myself liking a character that I absolutely abhorred in the last book. I even tried to talk myself out of liking him because of how much I detested him in The City Center but it didn't take. That's okay ... the way this character changed and developed made the story that much better and I wouldn't have had it any other way.

Keep in mind, as good as this book was, this is not one of those series where you can just pick up the 2nd book and then jump around. You need to read them in order otherwise you will be totally confused.

I'm super excited to see what the 3rd novel has in store for me!!

Amazon | Goodreads