Escaping Eleven by Jerri Chisholm Pages: 384
on December 8, 2020
Genres: Young Adult, Dystopian, Romance
Source: Finished Hardcover from Publisher
In Compound Eleven, the hierarchy of the floors is everything.
My name is Eve Hamilton, and on my floor, we fight.
Which at least is better than the bottom floor, where they toil away in misery. Only the top floor has any ease in this harsh world; they rule from their gilded offices.
Because four generations ago, Earth was rendered uninhabitable—the sun too hot, the land too barren. Those who remained were forced underground. While not a perfect life down here, I’ve learned to survive as a fighter.Except my latest match is different. Instead of someone from the circuit, my opponent is a mysterious boy from the top floor. And the look in his eyes tells me he’s different…maybe even kind.
Right before he kicks my ass.
Still, there’s something about him—something that says he could be my salvation...or my undoing. Because I’m no longer content to just survive in Eleven. Today, I'm ready to fight for more than my next meal: I'm fighting for my freedom. And this boy may just be the edge I've been waiting on.
Escaping Eleven is a young adult dystopian romance by author Jerri Chisholm. Escaping Eleven is Jerri’s debut novel, and I really enjoyed it. I was excited to learn that it is going to be the first book in a series. Book two is called Unraveling Eleven and it is currently slated to be released in September of 2021! Escaping Eleven had a unique world set up. In this dystopian novel the climate of earth has made the world uninhabitable, and the remaining survivors of this area of the world are forced underground to live. Underground their new society is divided into a caste like system, where the floor that you live on determines your job, and your status within the compound. The higher to the top floor you are, the more upper class you are considered- quite literally.
Our main character, Eve lives on the lower floors of Compound Eleven, which puts her more in the laborer/have not category of this society. But Eve is scrappy, and may seem a little closed off an prickly to most outsiders looking in, but I appreciated her skeptical prickly nature. I loved Eve! I think she felt real and fleshed. She brought the story to life in my opinion. She is not living in an easy world by any means, and her outward personality likely helps her with her fights. In the lower floors there is something that felt like a fight club to me, and Eve is one of the best fighters! That is until a mysterious boy shows up and whoops her butt.
I loved that the lover interest, Wren, started off by fighting her. Because though Wren is a great fighter, he is a real sweetheart. His compassionate soul helped to counterbalance out Eve’s harsh exterior I thought. I really enjoyed the two of them. And I liked the story of Escaping Eleven. I thought this novel has a really strong premise, and a great start and a awesome ending. I can’t wait for the next book. That being said, the story did drag a bit in the middle for me. But with the ending of escaping Eleven and I am really hopeful that the next book will have more action and movement in it. I would also like to learn a bit more about the world in the next installment. Overall, this was a solid start to a series. I am interested in continuing on and seeing what happens with Eve, Wren and with this world overall. I think this was a really good debut from author Jerri Chisholm. I can’t wait to read more from her!
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Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
- 2020 New Release Challenge
Christine @ Captivated Reading
Ohhh, I love the premise of this one. I haven’t read YA dystopian in a long while and this one sounds really good!