Unreal City


Fiction - Fantasy - General
216 Pages
Reviewed on 01/06/2015
Buy on Amazon

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    Book Review

Reviewed by Katelyn Hensel for Readers' Favorite

Sarah Wilkes doesn't know how to live in a world without her twin sister. Lea's murder has sent her into a spiral of depression and Sarah can't concentrate on college or anything she used to be interested in. She's desperate, desperate enough to allow a spirit to drink her blood and take her to the Unreal City.

So, being a twin myself, I have a real fear of losing my twin. There's just something about not having the person that's been on the Earth with you for your entire life, who's made up of your flesh and blood...just gone. I can totally feel Sarah's pain, but even if I wasn't a twin, her bleak tone, depressing thoughts, and crazy overblown reactions to little things would definitely come across as unstable and in pain. Because of all she's going through, you don't meet the character in the best of times so she can be a challenge to like. However, you can relate to her experience, and grow to like her as the plot moves along.

Unreal City by A.R. Meyering reads like a myth and has similarities both to the underworld and to the Celtic stories of dark faeries. I liked these, as well as the contemporary twist. I do wish that some of the plot was explained further as I felt that some ideas were only touched upon and could have been really made into poignant points, but overall, Unreal City is an interesting and compelling read from a 'new to me' author, A.R. Meyering.

Patricia Reding

“Horror” is not a genre that, as a rule, I turn to when I seek a good read to entertain me. Still, A. R. Meyering proved to me with Unreal City, why it is that horror tales engage readers as they do. Her writing has a lovely flow, her characters are full, and her imagination knows no bounds. I particularly applaud her for her fine use of less-than-common words (such as, by way of example, gelatinous, ambrosial, miasma, viscous, and opalescence). (It is nice to see younger readers offered a work with a rich vocabulary.)

In Unreal City, Sarah Wilkes suffers the grievous loss of her twin sister, Lea. Thereafter, a strange spirit stalks Sarah, leaving her unable to concentrate on her new college surroundings and events. Sarah must determine if Unreal City, the place to which the spirit takes her, is a dream or a nightmare. Without giving away any good parts, suffice it to say that Unreal City may, in fact, be a bit of both. Accordingly, Sarah is right to fear for Joy, her new friend, a young woman with a giving heart and sacrificial spirit.

Unreal City offers that creepy “hair-raising” feeling on your arms and that unexplainable curiosity that sets upon you when a shadow passes by slowly, unexpectedly. In this read that I would recommend for the mature YA audience, Meyering has personified longing, fear, and even a bit of regret. Along the way, she has articulated an important principle: that sometimes the greatest pain comes because we refuse to let go of that which hurts us the most. With Unreal City, Meyering clearly earned her Literary Classics’ Gold Medal for YA horror!