Infinity by Jus Accardo - Book Review

* I received this book from Entangled Publishing LLC via Netgalley for an honest review. As always, I only ever write my true thoughts *

                            

                                                      Infinity by Jus Accardo

                                           Publication date: November 1, 2016

                                                          My rating: 4 stars

Best parallel universes book I have ever read (and trust me, I tried a few). 

Infinity was... wow.
Not what I was expecting. I had no idea this book was going to render me unable to do anything other than reading it.
My heart was pounding. My mind was all the way in. 
The risks were high and I was constantly scared for the characters. 

My favorite kind of book. 

I usually don't like to compare books to other things but, for lack of better words right now, I would say this book was somewhat of a mash-up between The Long Game, Hunting Lila and the anime Steins Gate. 

In other words: it was fantastic.  

 ∞∞∞

Kori is a 17-year-old artist. She's witty, tough, and a rebel who goes by her own rules.

That's how life is when you have a commander for a father and a mother dead from cancer. 

After getting caught for vandalism and her father too busy to deal with her, Kori finds herself babysitted by two strange army guys who are practically her age.
She doesn't need babysitting, but it doesn't seem like she has much of a choice in the matter.

What should have been a one time deal turns into a chase across the city after a bloodthirsty psychopath from another dimension.
A psychopath who's not only determined to wreck havoc until he finds what he wants but also kills Tori. Again and again and again. He doesn't really care how many dimensions it's going to take. 

Well, this Kori cares.
And she'll be damned if she does nothing to stop it. 

Ignore the official synopsis on Goodreads.
Ignore everything.
This is a book that needs to be read.
I can't tell you much more because most things in this book need to come as a surprise. Which is why I'm assuming there is hardly any actual information in the official synopsis. I tried to give here as much as I could but I don't want to ruin the experience for you.
So... read it. And then discuss it with me. Okay? (: 

  ∞∞∞

Full Review (with spoilers)

This is a story of love and revenge.

Across dimensions. 
It's been a while since I've read a story like that. 

At the beginning, I was almost as clueless as Kori as to what was going on. 

In the grand scheme of things, of course I knew a little bit more than her - like the fact that Dylan, Noah, and Cade were from a different dimension.
But aside from that, I knew nothing more.
The synopsis didn't give anything away and so we slowly unearthed things from Kori's POV. 
Slowly, because everyone seemed not to want to tell her anything at all. 

Got to hand it to Kori, she refused to back down.
Which I absolutely freaking LOVED about her. 

Do you know those books where everyone seems to know something the protagonist doesn't? And they all hide it from her for 'her own good'?
Well, I hate it.
I hate it so much.
And so does Kori.
Because more often than not, it ends up being the reason something horrible happens. How can the protagonist protect herself from something that obviously concerns her if everyone keeps on hiding the truth from her?
It makes no sense.
And many times, the protagonist gives up the fight or doesn't fight strongly enough for answers.
Not Kori. Kori doesn't follow orders. She questions them. She questions everything.
And she's also smart, tough as nails, and very perspective.
She's not a girl to be messed with.
She's someone I want as my friend.  

Then we have our two boys, Noah and Cade. Who are brothers in everything but blood.
They just saw the murder of their sister \ lover, and before they even had time to grieve they were forced to jump from dimension to dimension after the killer, who is not only hell bent on finding his dead lover, but also in killing Kori in every dimension.
How does a person even begin to deal with that kind of thing?

Well, there is the Cade method of dealing, which includes trying to save Kori as many times as it takes.
Despite the fact that his own Kori is gone, he doesn't intend to let any other Kori out there die.

And then there is the Noah method of dealing, which includes distancing himself and throwing all his pent up anger on the looks alike of his dead sister.
He refuses to believe Kori (our Kori) is her because he knows that if he'll get emotionally attached, even for a second, and she dies again... he wouldn't be able to take it. 

And then we have our run in the mill psychopath, Dylan, who will kill everything and everyone until he finds the girl he loves.
Which is disturbing, wrong, insane, psychotic but also... sympathetic.
Which I hate that I feel that way, because I hate Dylan so much. I hate that I feel even a twinge of sympathy for this maniac.

He's doing all the wrong and twisted things. There are so many other ways he could have gone about it. Like, I don't know, maybe try to find Ava without killing anyone?
But the guy went insane the moment he lost Ava.
Even if he gets some version of her back, I don't think he'll ever be the same again.
He won't be forgiven anyway. Not for everything he's done. 

At least he did one good thing at the end, giving Kori a chance to live.
Doesn't mean I like him for it. 

It wasn't funny, but for some reason we all burst out laughing. 

Ah, there is nothing quite like that bonding moment after an almost death, is there? 

I loved the tentative relationship between Noah and Kori. It was the sweetest thing.
Noah had lost his sister, and Kori is missing a brother. 

Despite the fact that it will never be the same, that our Kori will never replace the Kori Noah grew up with, I really feel that... towards the end, they started seeing they could have a special brother-sister bond of their own. 

I just loved all those little moments between them; when they held hands, when Noah was terrified after Kori was shocked, and when Noah was smiling from ear to ear as he realized Kori wasn't going to die but actually join them in their hunt across dimensions. 

Hi! I'm Kori, your almost cousin, and these two guys are from alternate reality where, apparently, we're both dead. If you'd kindly come with us, you could help stop a multiverse-hopping lunatic, who has a serious hard-on for you, from killing a lot of people. 

*laughing uncontrollably* Yeah, I'm sorry, Kori, but even I, a hardcore fantasy lover, would have thought it lunacy.

Now that Dylan is not dead and the hunt continues, I can't help but wonder what's in store for us next. 

What I'm hoping would happen: 

• More Kori & Noah bonding time (because there would never be enough of that).
• More Cade & Kori getting to know each other time (which I'm sure we'll get).
• Some much needed information about who Ava is. Because, honestly, all we really know about her is that she loves black colors, she's Kori's cousin in many dimensions, she died in a car accident, and she's the love of Dylan's life.
  What we don't know about her is: did she love Dylan just as much as he loves her? What was she like - in terms of personality? How did she get along with Kori, Cade, and Noah? And basically everything else. When you think about it, we really don't know anything about her.
• Kori meeting her mother. Yes, we all know it will never be the same and that Kori's real mother is dead, but... like Kori said, it doesn't matter as long as she'll get to have at least one last conversation with her mother.

And that's pretty much all I can think of at the moment.
This book was great and I enjoyed it so much.  

And now... 

I think I'm going to read Jus Accardo other books as I wait for the next Infinity. 

Another Love - Tom Odell

In an infinite universe, anything that could be imagined might somewhere exsist. 

-- Dean Koonz, Dead and Alive