Review: Gripping But Safe
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 03 18, 2014
The Wicked We Have Done is a compelling if ultimately flawed book, a melange of what has been written in dystopian lately (though this is more near future than dystopian). Although it keeps interest throughout, weak characters and questionable worldbuilding issues ultimately left an unsatisfying read. The author would have needed to take more risks with the character and world to have created a truly unique read.Plot: Evalyn Ibarra committed a terrible crime and murdered innocents. Her sentence would most likely have been life in prison but a new government program, aimed at saving money from prisoner housing costs, introduced an alternative. The criminals enter a computer controlled environment which can determine whether their crimes were one-time situational or part of a pathological need/desire to kill.  If the latter, they are killed in the arena by the program. If the former, they are released into society again.  In the Compass Room, Evalyn creates alliances, faces her crimes, and is subjected to psychological and physical dangers (in a forest-like location). Then the program begins to glitch and the surviving group realize they are in real trouble.Right off the bat, the characters were a bit of a let down.  The title and blurb give the impression we would see strong, determined, and vicious inmates. But what we got were half who had killed due to being pushed by someone else's actions (e.g., a lot of what we would call now "manslaughter" or "involuntary manslaughter") and the other half pathological killers.  When we finally do learn about the circumstances of the 'innocents', it becomes ludicrous they were put into the prison system in the first place.  The main characters Evalyn teams up with are all emo, blaming themselves for whatever deaths they caused (drunk driving, abusive family, etc.) and feeling like they 'deserved' the death they were going to get. It got old fast and that also make it far too obvious who could be trusted and who couldn't.  There really weren't any surprises, even with Evalyn's more conflicted fate (which we only learn at the end). I wish the 'tests' each of them faced were more thought out and clever, a 'sneaky' way to get them to face their judgements rather than the obvious of recreating the crime scene and reciminations. Especially since Evalyn never seemed to face the actual crime she committed rather than the crime someone else committed because of her.The worldbuilding was also problematic.  It just suspends too much belief that so much money and time would be put into a system that supposedly can determine people's true intentions (through an implant and then some deus ex machina technology).  Honestly, if the author is going to do a concept similar to very popular novels out there, and give very powerful technology to achieve the plot, then the worldbuilding better be pretty darn spectacular. We have criminals, we have technology that can make thoughts/memories real, yet the plot is pretty straightforward and not very engaging.  As well, it's hard to believe that there is technology that can pretty much read minds/mimic then 3D map those memories into an environment yet - it has to take a MONTH's worth of testing to figure out if someone is a pathological killer or not?  All the tests could have been done the same day, with less cost, I might add.If you combine worldbuilding issues with passive/emo characters who are just a bit too goody-two-shoes, then you are going to make it difficult for readers to connect with the plot. I would have liked to see the moral boundaries blurred a bit more and with a bit more inventiveness.  That said, this is an easy and engaging read.Reviewed from an ARC.