Tessa by: Kfir Luzzatto

This review was requested by the author.

Tessa was just a regular girl living her normal life until the government took her away from her family at the age of fourteen. They took her and trained her mind and her gifts, honing her into a blade. She can look into other people’s minds. When a critical mission requires the best of the best, Tessa is called in. In order for Tessa to complete the mission, she will have to use her cultivated gifts like never before. Her loyalty to the service and her loyalty to the young woman that she has fallen in love with will be put to the test. The government turned her into the best but now will they be able to stop her from doing what she wants?

When the author of this book contacted me and asked if I would be willing to review this book, I was excited. Once I read the blurb of the book, I was even more excited because this kind of sci-fi story is right up my alley. It sounded like Breaking Sky but with mind-reading which meant that I had to get my hands on it and start reading it as soon as possible. Unfortunately for me, Tessa did not live up to my expectations. There were a few problems that I had with this book and a few things that I really liked about this book. Let's dive right in!

The thing that I really, really liked about this book was the premise. What an amazing idea! Mind-reading but make it science. The thing about this idea that makes it even cooler is the fact that remote-viewing is not fiction. Remote viewing is something that has already been tested out by governments. In fact the author provides quite a bit of information on these programs and how remote viewing could work in the real world. It’s some fascinating stuff. I love reading about secret programs of the military that are trying out new and unheard of stuff and Tessa really caters to that. I liked the idea when I first heard of it but once I read the notes about the real remote viewing program, I was in love. I want there to be more books that explore this sort of mind reading without going into fantasy or magic.

The other thing that I liked about this book was the plot. I don’t think there was ever a moment where I felt like the story was struggling to move forward. There was always something new happening and there wasn’t any stagnation. This book has a lot of action over it’s 160 odd pages, it's an action dense book. Some people may argue that the story went by too fast because it is quite a short book. I’m gonna have to disagree with them because stretching this book out to be longer would have probably turned this book into a series. I have nothing against series but I feel like there are too many sci-fi series and not enough sci-fi books that are stand-alones. I don’t want to always be reading three or four books in order to get a full story arc, sometimes I want to read a single book and be done. This book is an example of a one and done book.

While I love that this book is not a series I would have liked for the book to be bigger in terms of pages. The book as it stands, severely lacks descriptions. It feels more like a really thorough draft of a book rather than an actual book. There are several instances in this book where Tessa says, “I won’t bore you with the details [of x y and z].” However, given that the story doesn’t have a lot of descriptions, I want to be bored with the details. I want to know how it felt for Tessa to practice using equipment that she had never used before. I want to know what tasks she had to perform to see if she was getting used to using that equipment. I want to know what the purpose of the tasks were and how they would help Tessa in the field. I want the details. The narration of the story was a little too matter of fact for my taste. I was being told the story by Tessa but what I wanted was to experience the story with her and due to lack of details and descriptions I couldn’t experience the story. 

There were two other things that bothered me about this book, Tessa’s overall demeanor and a couple plot points. While I was reading this book, I became uncomfortable with Tessa’s age and the way that she was acting. As someone who has been seventeen at one point, I don’t think that Tessa’s thought process or the way she acts matches. She feels much older than she actually is. But even if I discount that there is some “romance” in there that I don’t think is age appropriate especially given the differences in the two characters’ ages. On top of that, the way she acted made me dislike her. I don’t want to spoil the specific incidents but I found myself not liking her as a person, however she redeemed herself by owning her behavior and acknowledging it as well as becoming a slightly better person. The other thing that bothered me was that there was a plot hole that I encountered. It was explained and sort of fixed a few chapters down the line but nobody likes a plot hole. 

Overall I’d give this book 2 solid stars. As much as I loved the premise of this book and the plot of this book, the lack of descriptiveness and the uncomfortable romance took away from the experience of reading this book. If this book had been tad more descriptive, if I had been able to experience this book and the story within, I would have definitely given it three stars. The thing that makes me sad is the amount of potential that this story had but wasn’t able to reach because it felt like I was being briefed about the story. I’m not going to recommend that you read this book but I’m also not going to recommend that you don’t read this book. If you feel like taking a risk, go for it!