Book Review: Candor by Pam Bachorz

Title: Candor
Author: Pam Bachorz 
Published: 2009
Pages: 286
My Rating: 2.5

In the model community of Candor, Florida, every teen wants to be like Oscar Banks. The son of the town's founder, Oscar earns straight As, is student-body president, and is in demand for every club and cause. But Oscar has a secret. He knows that parents bring their teens to Candor to make them respectful, compliant–perfect–through subliminal Messages that carefully correct and control their behavior. And Oscar' s built a business sabotaging his father's scheme with Messages of his own, getting his clients out before they're turned. After all, who would ever suspect the perfect Oscar Banks? Then he meets Nia, the girl he can't stand to see changed. Saving Nia means losing her forever. Keeping her in Candor, Oscar risks exposure . . . and more.

Candor was a very quick read. After spending a week reading Graceling, it was nice to read this short and sweet book in two days. It was also nice to read a Young Adult book knowing that it isn't part of a series.

I found the writing of this book very simple. It was good at getting the story going, but it gave us little insight into the head of our main character, other than the obvious. There was also little description into the how the subliminal messaging works, other than the fact that it is delivered through the music. I didn't feel like the concept had been explored very well and fell flat, seeming a little unoriginal.

I loved the character Nia, she was the only real interesting aspect of the story. The main character, Oscar, was a little dull and obvious, and his back story seemed undeveloped.

Overall, I was quite underwhelmed by this book. I expected more depth to the concept, and definitely more excitement. What's odd is that even though it is (as far as I can tell) a stand alone book, it felt incomplete. I half expected to turn over the back cover and find a page advertising the next book. Saying this, I know I've given it a relatively low rating, there wasn't actually anything really bad about it or anything I hated about it, it was just underwhelming, as I said, and the ending was just as underwhelming as the rest of the book, there wasn't really anything spectacular about it.