“Twisty, grisly, genre-bending and immersive, Not Even Bones will grab you by the throat and drag you along as it gleefully tramples all of your expectations.” –Sara Holland, New York Times best-selling author of Everless Dexter meets This Savage Song in this dark fantasy about a girl who sells magical body parts on the black market — until she’s betrayed. Nita doesn’t murder supernatural … she’s betrayed.
Nita doesn’t murder supernatural beings and sell their body parts on the internet–her mother does that. Nita just dissects the bodies after they’ve been “acquired.” Until her mom brings home a live specimen and Nita decides she wants out; dissecting a scared teenage boy is a step too far. But when she decides to save her mother’s victim, she ends up sold in his place–because Nita herself isn’t exactly “human.” She has the ability to alter her biology, a talent that is priceless on the black market. Now on the other side of the bars, if she wants to escape, Nita must ask herself if she’s willing to become the worst kind of monster.
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Not Even Bones is an incredible novel, and I am mad at myself for not picking this novel up sooner.
A dark fantasy, Not Even Bones follows Nita, a young girl who works for her mother selling magical body parts on the black market. That is until she is betrayed and placed on that very same market.
Enriching Complex Characters
It is such a tantalizing and dark fantasy, getting into the head of Nita. She has such a questionable upbringing, having a fascination with dissecting bodies. When the blurb says, Dexter meets This Savage Song¸ it does mean that.
Getting inside Nita’s head is fascinating. She questions her identity, of whether she is a sociopath. However, when her mother brings someone alive, a young boy her age, Nita begins to question what she does with her mother.
It is a compelling character-driven novel, especially once the black market kidnaps Nita to sell. Nita was going to try to get out, but now she will do anything to save herself.
Not Even Bones is a morally questionable novel as it follows Nita’s change in position. With the ability to heal herself, she is now the most wanted item in the black market, and to save herself; she needs to put her morals aside. Following Nita’s narrative and growth through the novel is so compelling because it raises many questions not just for the reader but for Nita as well. It gives her character life; it makes her flawed, relatable, and multi-faceted.
The same goes for Kovit. The story shows Kovit as one thing, but as the story goes on, the complexities surrounding him. He is an unnatural, on the dangerous species list, but there is so much beneath the surface. He is as complicated as Nita, with so many layers to his personality, and so much history that makes him an engaging character.
Amazing Story
As with the characters, the story is also so amazing. There is much tension in the story and the space in which the story takes place is small. For most of the novel, Nita is in a cage, trying to survive, and it is the tension of her situation that gives the story its edge. Given her situation, Nita is now alive on the other side of the coin. All she wants is to escape, to survive, but there is a cost to it, a deadly cost.
The pacing is impressive considering the lack of scenery. It steadily raises the tension as it develops the characters and the story, giving the reader a clear evolution of the story. It was amazing to see the story unfold, to see it move and escalate, to see Nita grow as a character as she embarks on this morally questionable quest of survival.
I read this book a few months ago and I fell in love with it! I read this in 3 days, it was so good. I purchased the second book after.
I didn’t like it at first but then I kept reading and now I am impatient for book two. This is a very dark book. There are no “good” people.
Not Even Bones wasn’t exactly what I expected, at all. I had anticipated dark and lots of subterfuge and murder. While all of things can accurately describe the book I just expected in to be with a higher intensity. The pacing for Not Even Bones was slow, as soon as things were just getting interesting the book was over.
I struggled to connect with Nita, our main character. She was likened to a villain and someone that people would hate. I didn’t hate her and I didn’t love her, I honestly didn’t connect and feel anything for her, although this could because she had been isolated socially most of her life and I wasn’t supposed to be able to connect with her.
I actually did enjoy our other main character, Kovit. He is a zannie, a monster that eats people’s pain. I love the violence and menace his character portrayed. He had interesting morals for such a “monster”. He kept me engaged in the story when Nita left me with something to be desired.
Overall I enjoyed the plot and concept of Not Even Bones, I just wish it would have sped up, because it was a tad redundant at times. I will read the next book in the series as I need to know what happens, and I hope that I feel more for Nita in the next book, I’m hoping for heart pounding moments.
Deliciously dark and devious, with morally grey characters that make you question what is good and what is truly evil. Warning: don’t read in the dark.
Twisty, grisly, genre-bending and immersive, Not Even Bones will grab you by the throat and drag you along as it gleefully tramples all of your expectations.
Gritty, compelling, a tale to feed the monster in all of us. I couldn’t put this one down.