Kaniesha Reviews: Fake ID by Lamar Giles

Title: Fake ID
Series: Stand-Alone
Author: Lamar Giles
Release date: January 21, 2014
Publisher: HarperCollins
Genres: contemporary, action, mystery
Goodreads

Nick Pearson is hiding in plain sight…

My name isn’t really Nick Pearson.

I shouldn’t tell you where I’m from or why my family moved to Stepton, Virginia.

I shouldn’t tell you who I really am, or my hair, eye, and skin color.

And I definitely shouldn’t tell you about my friend Eli Cruz and the major conspiracy he was about to uncover when he died—right after I moved to town. About how I had to choose between solving his murder with his hot sister, Reya, and “staying low-key” like the Program has taught me. About how moving to Stepon changed my life forever.

But I’m going to.

Okay, so Fake ID. That’s it, really. It was very okay. I’m thinking back on it right now and the major problem for me is that I never fell in love with it, or any of the characters. The description (above) reads like you’re in for this crazy ride where this badass kid is evading bad guys and his friend gets killed in the adventure. It’s nothing like that. It reads like a pitiful contemporary more than anything. I’m not sure why the series gets tagged with “thriller” because there’s nothing thrilling about it.

First of all, we’ve got our main character, Nick. Nick’s a cool guy but the rest of his personality is kind of flat. He’s just nice. He’s kind of polite. He’s a bit sarcastic and witty. He’s not dumb. He’s just normal. That’s fine! That’s great! But he doesn’t ever really do anything that gets you hooked into the story. Characters are what I concentrate on: if I can’t love characters, if I can’t care about them and their thoughts, then the story is average. The only side character I cared anything about was Eli and he gets killed! We barely get to know the kid at all and he dies and Nick continues to date/get to know the boy’s sister. Speaking of Eli’s sister, Reya. She’s not intriguing either. She’s just there to be a romance subplot filler. I was really hoping she’d be more hands-on when it came to Eli’s murder, but all she did was help Nick a bit, here and there.

In truth, I really don’t know how to feel about this book. It was good but it wasn’t great. I think it’s definitely something to support over other books of the same degree because DIVERSITY! The main character is a black boy. He has both his parents. His love interest is latina. Wonderful! The action, plot, and backstory are all planned out well and executed nicely. Even the conclusion isn’t what I was expecting, even if there were hints along the way.

Definitely a book to check out if you’re interested in male POV and have some patience when it comes to cliche high school scenarios and slow parts!

Rating: 3.5/5 stars