Dear book-lovers,

Welcome to the stop on blog tour for an YA spy romance with sci-fi elements – Ionic Attraction by D.R. Rosensteel 🙂 You will find in this post details about the book, author, and my review.

Book Details

Title: Ionic Attraction

Author: D.R. Rosensteel

Genre: YA Contemporary Fiction

Release Date: January 6th 2020

Publisher: Entangled Teen

Summary:

Zach’s got a secret. The only reason he’s agreed to an internship at the Mastermind Complex, a high-tech academy for teens, is to use their supercomputer to find the person who framed him. He never stole anything but was locked up in juvie anyway. Now he’s out, he’s got a plan, and nothing will get in his way…not even the girl he’s been partnered with, who excels at proving opposites attract.

Jane’s got a secret. She was the informant who led to Zach’s arrest. Did she mean for that to happen? No way. And now she has to work with him to save the world. Because an “internship” at the Mastermind Complex is actually a program to train super-geniuses as soldiers in a war of the minds. Zach’s and Jane’s intellectual skills complement each other, making them an unbeatable pair.

She can’t resist their ionic attraction, but if he ever discovers the truth, she’ll lose him forever. And worse, breaking their partnership would mean sacrificing all the innocent lives depending on them.

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Purchasing links: AMAZON

About Author

D. R. Rosensteel is a research consultant who had no intention of writing anything but technical papers describing his theories of metaphysical psychometry. But when a hoodied teen showed him a device that turned her thoughts into weapons, and told him about a secret society of protectors who trained her in their underground Academy, he knew her story had to be written. Rosensteel has put his research on hold to document the adventures of a girl whose face he’s never seen and whose real name he’ll never know.

Author links: WEBSITE / TWITTER / GOODREADS

Review

Title: Ionic Attraction
Author: D.R. Rosensteel
Publication Year: 2020
Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary Fiction
Source: eARC via NetGalley by YA Bound Book Tours
Rating: 3.5 Stars
Recommendation: Recommended for young teens (12-15 years old) who like stories about spies, who enjoy stories with sci-fi elements in contemporary setting and/or cute romance books

My Thoughts

So I will not dwell for long in review of this YA sci-fi spy romance in contemporary setting. As an adult I often love YA books, however, this book did feel more juvenile, so I would say that mainly younger teens will fully enjoy this story. The title for this book was well chosen and actually well presented in the book, which was a nice touch from the author.

She stopped for an instant, smiled at him, and in that moment knew that no matter what happened, the ionic attraction between them could never be broken.

The story was intriguing, with some mystery and action. The romance was cute and PG. Both main characters (as we read from two POVs – Zach and Jane) were fun to read about and get to know, because at times their minds worked in interesting ways. However, the side characters could have been more fleshed out as we only learned that they are super smart and that was basically it. I liked the dynamics between Zachary and his brothers as they felt like they were real siblings. There were several pop culture references as well, and there were sci-fi elements with some gadgets, very advanced AI and IT. The book was full of science, and also with smart and complicated words, which a few times did not actually feel like they had a real meaning, but at the same time it made you feel like you are reading a decent sci-fi spy fiction. Also I did stumble on a couple of plot holes and unbelievable moments, and Jane’s father’s actions close to the end felt out of character and unrealistic. Also villains in this story were not portrayed well or deep enough.

Jane nodded. This was looking up. “So what’s the experiment?”

“I actually got the idea from something you said. I’ll ask to hold your hand. If we have an ionic bond, you’ll agree.”

“And if we have a covalent bond?”

Zachary stared at his feet and quietly said, “You’ll punch me in the stomach.”

My favourite part of this books was Zachary and Jane’s interactions and romance. Together they were just a lot of fun and cuteness.

Then his fingers touched hers. They wove together like the lights of the borealis bursting through the gray, and Zach felt her hand in his. All at once, he could feel the shadow of his arm. He pulled Jane toward him and he had two arms, and they wrapped around her. Jane’s hands touched his cheeks, cupped them tightly, and he could feel. Jane was real. He could feel her. Jane and nothing else.

I liked the story even though it was juvenile and I wanted much more from it, but it was sentimentality that guided me, because if I had read this book when I was 12 or 14 years old, I would have loved it, as I was the perfect audience for this story with my love for stories about kid secret agents or detectives.

Jane huffed but couldn’t hide her smile. “Oh, you are impossible!”

“Did we just make up without fighting?”

Jane puled his hand to her cheek. “We did.”

“I thought so. Calling me impossible, though, that’s a problem.”

“Oh?”

“Impossible is a non-provable concept, Miss Lew. No way to conduct an experiment. I propose a different hypothesis.”

“Oh, do you, Mr Keen? And how would you phrase this hypothesis?”

“Simple. I believe we’re in love.”

This was a very cute, sweet and clean sciency romance with teen secret agents and just perfect for younger teen readers. It was also a fast, easy, fun and entertaining read. I would read another books in this world, also Zah’s brothers’ stories could be interesting to see.

Happy reading,
Lady of Bookland