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Think twice before you betray your best friend ... A chilling fast-paced thriller from the author of Darkside.
Adam has betrayed his best friend and now he must face the consequences. His punishment is 274 years in the Dial, a prison in a no-time world, where teenage traitors are forced to atone for their crime. It's a terrible place, ruled over by a cruel despot, where every day is a struggle for survival - and escape.
Legend has it that only one person has fled the Colditz-like prison. Nobody knows if he made it back to the real world, but he left behind a ray of hope that has reached through the years. Soon Adam is caught up in a deadly plan to escape. But in a world full of traitors, you can trust no one.
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This book has a lot going for it, great story and more twists than a plateful of spaghetti, just when you think you have unraveled one strand and know what has happened and what should be happening next the whole plot changes. It was obvious that there was a traitor in the dial with them but since they had all betrayed someone on earth (yes this prison exists in some kind of "no space" where nothing is as it seems) not sure why the characters were surprised to find that someone was betraying them. I also had the thought that some people should have been on the dial with the co conspirator but for the sake of the story Adam was the only one found guilty of betrayal.
The explanations for how the prison operated were well thought out, a lot of imagination was used. Some parts were remarkably similar to Harry Potter and some parts were just strange. I must admit that I never even considered that particular person as the traitor but after a few chapters I had given up trying to make sense of all the twists and turns as it was giving me a headache.
The "good" guys were not that distinguishable from the bad guys, a good explanation was given for most things. The guards were obviously adults who felt the kids needed a good lesson and the prisoners were too ashamed of their own actions. A lot of imagination is needed (jail sentence of 274 years is considered normal ) and I am not sure I would read this book again but worth reading at least once.
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