This book had no problem keeping my rapt attention throughout. Beat by beat, I never lost my focus once while reading this. A lot of books–especially fantasy books–contain some slower parts that are harder to get through, and leave much to be desired. In “Alone”, however, there’s never a dull moment to be found.

It’s also achieved another rare feat: I don’t think I found a single plothole, error, or inconsistency throughout the entire book. All the details are seamlessly sewn together. Nothing really goes unexplained, nothing conflicts other parts of the story, and nothing is left for the readers to fill in the blanks. It hits all the barks for a good plot, while also maintaining originality and engagement.

Every character in this book that I can think of is interesting and unique, and brings something different to the story. There are no cookie cutters, stock characters, or cliché archetypes to be found. They’re complex, nuanced, and just generally relatable in an endearing way. Now, this is not to say each character is some sort of allegory or metaphor to some deeper meaning. Rather, the characters feel like normal people

I think this book contains deeper meaning behind it, that’s not essential to the plot, but can enhance the reading experience if you’re looking out for it. For instance, the whole idea of her being hidden from the outside world, only to be thrust into an environment of chaos and mystery, can be viewed as an allegory for hardship and adulthood. It conveys that parents try so hard to protect us from the horrors of the outside world, only to ultimately be to our detriment. And that once we are eventually forced out of the parental bubble, we encounter tribulations and menaces beyond our ability to understand. There are more examples, but the reader has the choice to acknowledge them, or just read it for the plot and the lore. You can get what you want from it, and I think that’s beautiful.

Alas, a good portion of my qualms with this book arise not from what is included, but rather, from what isn’t. For what I can only assume to be in the interest of saving time, Crane seems to gloss over and “yadda-yadda” his way through some elements of his story that I would have preferred he focused on. The major one that stuck out to me was that there should have been more focus on showing how Sienna acclimated to her new environment at the directorate. It feels like she just shows up there, says “hey, this is my life now”, and goes about her daily activities. I know that this is not actually the case, but this is the feeling that’s given, since there’s almost no time devoted to describing how exactly she got settled in. A well-written panic attack scene might very well have fixed this issue.

This one almost entirely involves the main character and narrator, Sienna Nealon. She makes a ton of wise cracks, jokes, and pop culture references that seem unusual at times. A lot of the dialogue comes off as unnatural and tends to break the immersion. I personally don’t think it’s that big of a problem, and I understand that it’s a result of her ignorance to the outside world, her only knowledge of non-maternal human interaction being that which she’s seen on TV. But other readers might not be as fond of this, so it’s worth mentioning.