Desperation Breeds Heroes... (dystopian sci-fi review of Complex)

Pollution. Overcrowding. Poverty. Disease. Hunger. Rampant crime. Political upheaval and uncertainty. A pandemic. People struggling to survive just one more day, and then another. 

And a few of them, here and there, deciding—for one reason or another—that they’re not gonna take it any more [hopefully you just started bobbing your head to Twisted Sister, but if you weren’t, until right this second, you’re welcome].

It could be today, tomorrow, or at some point not so far into the future, as in A.D. Enderly’s serpentine, dystopian sci-fi series debut, Complex.

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Everything basically sucks, in this dog-eat-dog world—especially if you’re just a nobody, trying to live your life—and Val knows that better than most. At 18, she’s already been the “parent” in her family for a couple years, responsible for food, shelter, and the general well-being of not only herself, but also of her younger sister, Kat.

Sure, things could be easier… if she agreed to basically sign her life away on a handful of dotted lines, giving up her few freedoms so they could move to a “Complex”—in essence, a tiny nation-state, created and run by mega-corporations, which provide safety, jobs, shelter, and other bright and shiny amenities for all inhabitants under their “care”… in exchange for those inhabitants relinquishing all of their rights and free will. And the last promise Val made to her father before he died was to never, ever, do that.

When Kat is kidnapped from their tiny hole-in-the-wall apartment in the dead of night—for reasons Val can’t even begin to imagine—the choice to remain independent is no longer so cut-and-dried, though; Val has no idea who took her sis, or why, or how to even begin to get her back. All Val knows for sure is that finding Kat is the only thing that matters. 

With a little luck—and a few chance encounters with other decent people, who have no more fondness for or allegiance to any of the Complexes than she has—Val hatches a risky plan. She soon realizes that what she’d previously thought was “the worst” part about those alluring institutions—the forfeiture of one’s freedoms—is actually just the tip of the iceberg… and that rescuing Kat from the clutches of one such Complex will be a helluva lot harder than she could've dreamed. 

It isn’t only Kat’s life, or those of Val-and-friends, which hang in the balance; in this race for their lives, the very fate of humanity—meaning the futures of millions of people—dangles by a tenuous thread. And Val, well... she's not about to give up, not without a fight to the death.

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So here’s my quandary: if I let this review sit right there, a lot of you might think Complex sounds pretty interesting [it is], go out and pick up a copy (or download an ebook), then dive right in… at which point you’d probably scratch your head and circle back to here, making sure you grabbed the right book.

Why? Because—although I laid out the essential pieces of the key plot for you—there’s A LOT going on in this book. There are A LOT of characters (whom Enderly takes the time to give his readers a good sense of), doing A LOT of things. There are political machinations, labyrinthine plots, and a fair number of back stories—basically, all sorts of sketchy little alleyways to poke your head down (before trying to get back to the main path… or paths). Each chapter is told from a different POV, alternating between a dozen or so different characters, doling out the story in a piecemeal sort of fashion (which means keeping track of who everyone is, and fitting in each little piece of the story into the overall bigger picture, takes a concerted effort). 

[Arrrrrgh, I can hold in the “dad joke” pun no longer: Complex is... complex! There, now that’s out of my system.]

Enderly masterfully weaves together a fascinating tale, chockfull of despair, desperation, and grim determination… interspersed with moments of humor, love, and hope. I thoroughly enjoyed Complex, on the whole, and recommend it to fellow fans of dystopian sci-fi. (And when the next book in the series drops? I'll be snapping it up.)

Just… don’t go into this one thinking it’ll be a walk in the park, or that you can speed-read it. (I’m not a speed reader, so YMMV, but let’s just say you’ve been warned, mkay? ;))

~GlamKitty