This story takes “coming of age” and “self-discovery” to a whole new level.

The world has recovered from the unleashing of the Terrorism Virus. New cities have been established, each with their own form of government. The people have adjusted to the new norm. However, war will never stop raging.

The free people of Coalition are either citizens or military. Only Talent is allowed into the military. Only non-Talent are allowed to be regular citizens. The people of Coalition are proud of their democracy.

Archduke Goldwater of Liberty is a tyrant. His people live in squalor and fear. Talent shades their eyes with rose colored glasses making most of them giddy with happiness. The never-ending war means they have sacrifices to make but are happy to do it for the protection from the Coalition terrorists.

This book highlights an interesting take on “those with Talent hold the Power.” This story is about the war between those who wield power and those whose power wields them. Who or what maintains control? It’s not easy to remain true to one’s moral compass. ( )

There was a lot going for this YA dystopian urban fantasy novel that I liked: a grim future with loss of freedom, a society divided between ordinary humans and the select few that develop a special psychic ability called Talent and a military theme where the unwitting hero is forced to engage in war with an enemy city ironically called Liberty.

The story begins on a strong note. Eighteen year old Jayden is growing fed up living with his uptight uncle who has seemingly always worked in the military and treats him with disdain at best due to his laziness and lack of initiative. Indeed, Jayden seems to be vastly pretentious always badmouthing his uncle that never beat him even though he himself grew up with an abusive father and never doing even simple house chores. Heck, Jayden admits that his uncle lives in a nice house in the best part of Locke's Coalition, a sort of fortified city that is better off than other regions of the world but he still seems to whine a lot.

And then after he accompanies his best friend Ben outside of the safety of the city walls to wander in the forest, we start to see glimpses of his persona. Bullied relentlessly as a child for no apparent reason, Jayden develops incessant anger issues that prevails (ruining) the entire novel. He lets his emotions and feelings of insecurity make him make bad decisions. If lashing out on everyone wasn't annoying enough, the way he hounds after women acting clingy to the degree of being incapable of functioning *during* a super important espionage military mission seems to be inconcievable. You'd think Jayden is a heavily insecure 13 year old kid with all of his emotional issues.

Did I just hear Jayden is on a super important military mission despite his baggage? I still have a hard time believing they'd release Jayden's tether without addressing his most pressing emotional issues and along the way risk the life of a talented and overall decent person named Lilly. Jayden finally grows fed up with his uncle and tosses him across the living room.

His life is over.

After fleeing his home and taking refuge with Ben's family, he confesses that his recent spat of anger has just awakened latent telekinesis. Ben seems incredulous until Jayden lifts a rock surrounding it with green aura. Realizing that telekinesis is the only known ability that emits a colored aura and with talent searching day approaching, Jayden becomes horrified that his birth city is going to force him to become a soldier against his will and force him to kill people without flinching. Ben seems reassuring that military life isn't that bad and that everyone including his former bullies will respect him.

Jayden suddenly swishes all over the place and starts to think being powerful is all cool and stuff... until he is caught using telekinesis on a few bullies and ratted off to the police. The book seems to have a lot of plot holes and inconsistencies that got a lot on my nerves. Jayden ends up in prison and a kangaroo trial will certainly give him a life sentence in a maxinum security penitentiary. Just in the last minute, a soldier shows up and liberates him on the condition that he joins the forces.

He then shows up to the (previously mentioned to be obligatory) selection ceremony and any mentioning of his arrest lay forgotten. The book could have skipped those scenes and it would have never altered the course of the story. Jayden could have also skipped the part where he's flirting with a healer.

After discovering his already very rare ability is predicted to be absurdly powerful if he trains appropiately, Jayden spends 90% of his training time either whining that he only wants a boring desk job and harassing poor Lilly, pretty much demanding her to marry him on the spot. His overt stalking becomes disturbing real quick. Much to his chagrin, an annoying and self-righteous geek named Sid is also a vastly powerful telekinetic and they end up quarreling in the training field for no apparent reason.

Without being fully trained and definitely too emotionally immature for his good, Jayden and Lilly are forced to team up and infiltrate Liberty city to damage some military posts in the hopes the army can someday storm into the city and defeat the tyrant Archduke Goldwater.

I really think the book had a lot of things going for it. I liked the initial plot setting where in this world, the few with special psychic powers are reveled and conscripted into the military. The main issues involve Jayden's annoying personality traits, the way he views and treats women, his incessant wussiness and then some other things in the book. Stilted dialogue that becomes overtly corny at times, unidimensional bully characters, plot holes and deficient worldbuilding to name a few. The book references that knowledge of technology has been lost with the prior wars but the book doesn't really mention to what degree. Cars and other vehicles seem to no longer exist and everyone uses bikes or walk. Nobody owns horses. And yet newspapers and radios exist. We don't know how people cook their meals, just that food is rationed and civilians are highly patriotic.

It seemed to me that the book was too busy focusing itself on bullying and hounding women.

If there was one part of the book that really compelled me, it's the chapters of Jayden's imprisonment halfway into the book. I enjoy reading prison chapters a lot and the author does a marvelous job describing Jayden's agony during his torture, his failed suicide attempt and the harsher treatment that followed and his desperation when he realized nobody was going to rescue him. Jayden stopped acting like a whiny teenager and more of a matured character that was easier to root for. Those chapters were a bright light into an otherwise faulty story. Good enough to give the book 2 1/2 stars. ( )

The world has been on the brink of war since the peace has been made. Now Locke's Coalition is sending spies into Liberty to destabilize Liberty's government and to ensure war does not come to the Coalition. Jaden Stone, orphaned and raised by his uncle, is sent into Liberty. He has not been the best student but he has the strongest talent. Will he come back to the Coalition after he completes his assignment?

I liked this story but I struggled to get through it. It should have been edited to tighten the story up. The story could have been told in half the pages. The battle scenes became tedious and repetitive. The romances were unbelievable and could have been left out. They added nothing to the story. At times the logistics were lacking. Sofia was captured yet she is fighting in the battle that was to keep Jaden from rescuing her. The ending confused me. There were two endings written and, instead of taking one out, Mr. Terenna left them both in the book.

TALENT STORM is a good story but needs editing. ( )