Book Review: Mila 2.0

Mila was never meant to learn the truth about her identity. She was a girl living with her mother in a small Minnesota town. She was supposed to forget her past—that she was built in a secret computer science lab and programmed to do things real people would never do.

Now she has no choice but to run—from the dangerous operatives who want her terminated because she knows too much and from a mysterious group that wants to capture her alive and unlock her advanced technology. However, what Mila’s becoming is beyond anyone’s imagination, including her own, and it just might save her life.  Quoted from Goodreads

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First, isn't the cover just lovely.  This wasn't on my list in March, but between the cover and some great reviews, I couldn't stop myself from picking this up.  

This book is, simply put, an action packed adventure.  I tend to have certain expectations when I'm reading books (or watching movies) with androids. I expect them to explore what exactly it means to be human.  This book doesn't do that.  Sure, Mila is an android, but because she begins the book thinking she's human, and everyone's complaint about her is that she's "too human," this story never really explores the issue much.  Her being equal to a human and deserving human rights is a given.  It's just the big, bad corporations/government that treats her like a machine. As long as you go into this book expecting that, it's a really fun read.

The book starts out as sort of a typical YA book.  Grieving, new girl in town, meets new boy.  There's a mean girl thrown into the mix.  Stuff happens: romance, cruelty, and then the big reveal.  Mila finds out what she is, and that's when the action really kicks in.  From that point on, it's hard to put the book down.  There's always some chase going on, some group who wants to capture Mila and her mother.

Mila's relationship with her mom is one of my favorite things about this book---partly because that's really the driving relationship in the book.  Yes, we have the dreamy Hunter, who just gets Mila, and who she pines for throughout the story, but when Mila goes to escape the people chasing her, it's her mom she runs off with. Not the dreamy boy.  I really enjoyed exploring Mila's relationship with her mom.  It's not just your basic mother/daughter, but we have the whole creator/android/human mix thrown in there.  We get to see Mila freak out about what she is on so many different levels, but the love she feels for her mom is always there.

Possibly the most frustrating part of the story is the characters. There are lots of good beginnings, but we never find out much of anything about any of them.  We get Hunter, whose parents are never around and who is willing to drop everything to travel across the country for a girl he's only known for a few days.  We have a scientist in the lab who is there of his own free will, trying to help out his brother or something, but we never really get what his deal is either.  The bad guy, well he's just annoyingly evil, as is the mean girl, who I'm hoping doesn't make any sort of appearance in the next books.  It's not that the characters dont' have potential, but you sort of have to wait until the next book to find out what it really is.

All in all, if you're looking for a action that never lets up and clearly defined bad guys designed for your abject hatred, this is it.  This was a fun 3.5 stars for me.  Yes, it could have been more, but it was a lot of fun, and kept me reading long after I should have put it down. Plus, I still want to see what happens next to Mila.