Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks

The Battle to Stop a Malevolent Virus in Malice

Malice is the latest novel to come from the mind of Pintip Dunn. This novel blends famous dystopian and science fiction themes into one cohesive story. Time travel, viruses, coming of age, finding love, and a quest to save humanity. Those are just some of the themes found within these pages.

Thanks to a warning from her older self, Alice knows that somebody in her timeline will create a virus. This virus will be so powerful as to wipe out much of humanity and permanently alter our lives.

What’s more, the inventor of the virus is somebody that Alice knows. However, her future self isn’t willing to reveal who, as that is part of Alice’s task at hand. She must find this person, identify them, and then kill them.

Writing

The description of Malice makes it abundantly clear that Alice is one of the few who truly has a chance to save humanity. Though perhaps not for the reasons she would have ever hoped or expected. Many readers likely made assumptions and hopes based on that description – I know I did.

I also know that I was pleasantly surprised with Malice, and that’s saying something since this was a book I was looking forward to. Pintip Dunn wrote an alarmingly complex story here, one full of different elements, characters, and motivations.

It wasn’t at all what I expected, believe it or not. But it was still deeply fascinating. The hunt for the killer in the making is an intense plot. Throw in time travel, teenage drama, love, and family drama, and you’ve got a novel chock full of details and descriptions.

As with any novel, we like some characters more than others. However, I feel like that was more evident than ever in Malice. Some characters were so easy to hate (designed that way with intention), and then there were the characters that readers just couldn’t get enough of. It was an ideal balance, and it helped to drive the plot forward.

Development

Malice was a fast-paced novel. It seemed like every chapter was throwing Alice further and further into insane scenarios or desperate attempts. After all, this girl has humanity’s fate in her hands. So there wasn’t much room for idle time.

What is interesting is how the novel itself kicked off. It was not an introduction I expected, but that made it all the more intriguing. As did the introduction of time travel and everything that went with it.

Dunn took many common themes and elements and then twisted them into something new and different. It made it impossible to predict what would happen next, even when all of the pieces were laid out in front of us.

For that reason, Malice was extremely difficult to put down. I found myself compelled to keep picking it up, even when I only had time to read a page or two. I just had to know what was going to happen next. Had to see how Alice would save the day (assuming she would).

Conclusion

Malice was an interesting and unexpected read. Not every day you get to see a novel with many themes woven into one tale. Nor is it every day that you can find a novel that is so unpredictable and carefully written.

This novel was certainly an experience to read, and I don’t regret the time invested in it. And I will be curious to see what else Pintip Dunn will come out with next.

This review was originally written for Word of the Nerd, but has been ported over to Quirky Cat’s Fat Stacks now that the site has shut down.

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