Dark Eden by Chris Beckett

So when I was picking my next book from bloggingforbooks.org I decided from the little snippet I read about this book that I would enjoy it. 

My frustration started when only the ebook was available & so I was taken to a different site to purchase it. Still it wasn't too bad when I had to download the adobe digital reader instead of it just being able to be saved & me add it to my nook. This part was railing on my nerves because it did not go smooth but either way I finally got it on my nook and was looking forward to reading it 

Unfortunately I found things right away that I wasn't happy with. 

In reading some of the reviews before purchasing the book I already knew that the characters in it were limited in their vocabulary. So right away it was double words. Big big, small small, dark dark & so on. This drove me insane because the rest of the story did not support it. 

Eventually I got over it & just tried to get into the story. 

It took me quite a long time to read it just for the fact that I was not getting into the reading & the characters but I pushed ahead anyhow & started to pick out little things to get my brain to turn it's wheels about what was going to happen next. 

The book itself is about a group of people that consider themselves "Family". They have story times and Any Versires as they call it about how their Mother & Father come to Eden from Earth along with three other companions. 

The three companions choose to leave & try to make it back to Earth but Angela & Tommy choose to stay and in turn start to build a family that would eventually reach the 500 people who now reside in Eden at this time. 

However "this time" is what is confusing. Even though they call some of the vehicles and artifacts they find by the proper names, but not spelling, the time line just doesn't fit. 

In my reading I gathered that the original ones went through a worm hole then they crashed on Eden. 

Ultimately it feels as though they came from the future but the characters that exsist are more like the Indians making their own hunting equipment, living in little families under one big family. 

The majority of them have the same first name that was taken from Mother & Father. They have last names such as Spiketree &  Redlantern that have been named for the various trees & lights that they give off. But then there is London & Brooklyn named for Earth places.

The main character is John Redlantern and as a "newhair" he killed a leopard and brought it back to family instantly becoming a hero & as any young person he took it & ran with it. 

John always questioned was was beyond the Circle of family but no one would listen. We he speaks out of turn at one of the story times, the council quickly dismisses him & has his family head Bella deal with him. 

One of the oldest is named Mitch and he is the poster boy of how we view older people. Being treated like a child just because he has lost some of his senses. It goes to show that just because one can't hear or is losing their vision does not mean the brain is gone. 

Gerry is John's cousin (though you come to realize the entire colony is more like brothers & sisters) and he, like any younger family member, idolizes John. He was there when John killed the leopard & was the first to boast to anybody he came near. 

When John uprises against the ways of what they have been told & chooses to dismantle the original circles of rocks that were put there for when Earth returned for them he is thrown out of Family & was told never to return. 

After his group gives him provisions to help him out he leaves & heads out as far as possible to see what Eden had to offer outside the little forest that his family lived in. 

Eventually his love Tina Spiketree realized that change is coming to family & not for the better she choses to go in search of John & his cousins Gerry & Jeff tag along. 

Jeff, the youngest of them has one of the wisest minds and soon they capture a young Wollybuck to try to train it to be a horse like back on Earth. 

As time goes by more & more newhairs join them and they start to make a new family but John is never happy in one place & continues to make the group move on & on. 

Even Garry who thought that John was always right starts to question him causing a rift between the cousins & John wanting to venture on his own. 

With the death of one of their group by a snow leopard most turn on John for bringing then out there and soon the group splits into two different parts.

John & his group keep moving on looking for that perfect place but never being happy.

In the end they find something that tells them Earth is never coming for them & so they have to enjoy what they have not what they think they need. 

As I was reading I was getting the sense of a John being Peter Pan & not wanting to grow up & face reality as his companions long for home. 

All in all I give this 3 out of 5 stars. There were things I didn't like & just couldn't get behind but then something would happen & I'd be pulled right back in! 

I must say I did get this free from bloggingforbooks.org to read & review and I think that is one of the reasons that I finished it since it was touch & go for awhile but I'm glad I stuck it out.