Malice was an interesting read. It's unique and has some good elements to it. There's time-travel. There's love. There's mass genocide. It couldn't be more interesting.

Alice was having a normal day until a voice claiming to be her future self tells her she has to save the world. Trusting her future self she tells a boy she barely knows that she loves him and tries to find out who in her school is going to one day kill everyone.

I'm very mixed on this book and can't give my full thoughts on it. It was...okay? Maybe. A lot of confusion and a lot of dragging. From 11% to 85% in the book is only three or four days and that's just a lot of time for me. I don't know. I....I don't know. I can't give a good review of this book. It was fine. I didn't love it or like it even which sounds bad but I didn't hate it either.

Rating: 2-2.5

This book was so freaking good. Like, unputdownable, full of twists and turns and characters and feels. When I started, I didn't know that it would take as much of a sci-fi turn as it did, but I was really excited that it did! So let us delve into all the phenomenal stuff I loved in this book!

What I Loved:

• So much gray morality! I mean, the grayest of gray, The 100-level gray. I love me some morally ambiguous decision making, and Malice has it in droves! The choices these characters will have to make are loaded. Do they trust the voices telling them what they must do? Can they trust anyone? And how exactly can Alice make these decisions between the people she loves, and people in general? Love it. In the same vein, it's incredibly thought provoking and asks all sorts of questions that if you're like me, you have no idea how you'd answer!

• The characters were awesome all around. Alice was a great main character, for sure. She reacts to the information she gets and the decisions she must make in really authentic ways. And feeling invested in the side characters was equally important, because the stakes all felt super high as a result- I obviously cared what happened to all of them!

• It 100% kept me guessing. And oh, did I have guesses! My Kindle notes are filled with "ooooh I bet it's X!" and "oh nope, nope it's gotta be Y!" and of course I was wrong most of the time but guessed often enough that I ended up being right ;)

• Positively engrossing. Like I mentioned before, it was unputdownable. I stayed up too long reading, and paid for it the next day, and didn't even care. I read it every spare minute I had, tbh. Even when maybe I wasn't supposed to read 🙊

• The entire plot felt so unique and fresh, and I just devoured it. I extra liked that it was a bit more sci-fi than I'd expected. I think I expected mostly contemporary, and it was to an extent, but I also got this extra dose of sci-fi awesomeness!

Bottom Line: An absolute page-turner with phenomenal characters, thought-provoking choices, and a plot that captured me from the start.

Disclaimer: I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you to Fantastic Flying Book Club, Netgalley, and Entangled Publishing for this free copy. All quotes in this review are taken from the Advanced Reader Copy and may change in final publication.

Okay seriously this book had me on the edge of my seat the entire night I was reading it. If I wasn’t out for three whole days last week – meetings and a super bad migraine day – then I would have called out to finish this (well it’s a good thing I didn’t because that day I finished it, I had to do some important stuff, which I got done so WHOOT WHOOT). But YUS! I just wanted to stay home and read this whole thing in one sitting and that honestly rarely happens with me. Usually I need some sort of break in between.

So I normally totally forget about the synopsis or blurb of a book by the time I start reading it because I have been burned before and I just don’t want to remember that time. And this book was starting off as a cute little contemporary and I’m like…. okay that’s not the vibe I was getting from this cover but okay okay.

Then THE VOICE comes out of nowhere and literally gives her some full body shock and I’m like THERE IT IS. There’s the cray I was looking for. So I wasn’t disappointed. And then the whole thing about who the Voice actually was and like the future and all the steps that our girl Malice – I mean Alice – has to take to prevent a total freaking apocalypse breaking out from this virus thing killing like pretty much everyone… and wow I was in for the time of my darn life.

And that’s not even mentioning my boy Bandit! Ughhhhh what a cutie. I love his blue hair, from what I envision it to look like, and he just gives me all the bad boy image but really a good guy underneath vibes that I absolutely love and adore. UGH okay I just loved this one okay?! I don’t even know what else to say about it. I just loved it.

Pintip Dunn is back and her words are just as addictive. This is a suspense novel with a dash of romance and a whole lot of mystery. To save the world you must sabotage your future.

Alice is an ordinary girl with an extraordinary brother. She doesn’t think she’s anything special, in fact, she can’t even cook. When a voice in her head starts telling her she needs to save the world her future path is about to take a new route. Malice is the only way to stop a virus wiping out millions. What if you saw a glimpse of your future? Would you try and change it?

Alice knows the virus is created by someone at school but she doesn’t know all the facts. Now she has to test the waters and upset the balance. Starting with a cruel trick and a crazy message. Embarrassing herself is only half the battle. Losing hope isn’t an option.

Dystopian worlds are Pintip Dunn’s speciality. This one had me guessing all the way through. Her writing style pulls you in and makes you want to turn the page. I couldn’t wait to find out how all the pieces fit. Thankfully the ending didn’t disappoint and was executed perfectly.

This is a standalone story. 4 Stars out of 5.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 stars

Pintip Dunn has a knack for coming up with young adult science fiction stories that are interesting and creative but are not hardcore science fiction so they appeal to a wider readership that prefer scifi-lite, so to speak. That doesn’t mean they’re weak, by any means, just more accessible and I appreciate that.

The beauty of time travel is that there’s so much you can do with it, so many ways to make it the core of an intriguing tale and that’s true here. By offering a look at certain characters during different stages of their lives that haven’t happened yet, the focus can be on those characters and not so much on the setting or worldbuilding.

Alice is a perfectly normal teen or, at least, as normal as possible for a girl whose mother disappeared years ago and whose father has been emotionally distant ever since. In fact, Alice is the steady one in this family, especially in looking after her older brother, Archie, a prodigy who definitely has a few screws loose and a deep distrust of people. These two and a boy named Bandit are all crucial to the plot and, although I pegged the future creator of the global virus early on, that certainly didn’t keep me from wanting to see how everything would pan out.

Reviewed by Lelia Taylor, February 2020.

What a brilliant story of time travel. A complex and intricately woven tale that keeps you guessing until the very end!! I kept thinking I had it figured out and then....bam!! Another plot twist! The author describes and intertwines the present and the future is such a brilliant manner. I was on the edge of my seat with each turn of the page!

I was surprised how twisty and thriller suspense filled Malice is, expecting a typical YA romance with some elements of surprise I got instead a time chasing mystery that kept me turning the pages. The story starts out with a pretty straightforward High School scenario expecting an almost point by point plot seen in most teen romances. It definitely didn’t unfold the way I envisioned which makes Malice a must for sci fi/ dystopian mystery fans. From the very first chapter readers will know right away that this story is more than a romance. Its a first Pintip Dunn book that I’ve read and I might start checking out her other books after this one.

Malice was my first read by Pintip Dunn, but it definitely won't be my last! This was such an engaging and compelling story, a time-traveling suspenseful mystery wrapped up with a budding young romance.
Alice is an ordinary girl thrown into extraordinary cirumstances, and I didn't envy her one bit. Okay, maybe I envied her just the tiniest bit- at least my 17yo self would have. When a voice in her head starts speaking to her, Alice's life is completely turned on its axis and her future, and the future of the world, is thrown into jeopardy- and the weight of it all rests on her young shoulders. There were so many twists and turns in this story, like Alice I wasn't sure what was coming next. I loved how Ms. Dunn was able to keep me on my toes, up until the very end. I'm not sure if the plan is to turn this into a series, but that ending has me hoping for more.

A twisty time travel tale! This is one of those books that keeps you on your toes---Alice's future self has contacted her because she needs current-Alice to stop a classmate from creating a virus that will decimate the population. You're left not only wondering who will be a future evil genius, but also trying to piece together how future-Alice's instructions will possibly stop the upcoming apocalypse. I love stories like this because it's so fun to try and figure out exactly what's going on. I actually had the villain pinned right from the start, but the book definitely threw me for more than a few loops by the end as the time travel aspect of the book got twistier and twistier. Alice is never sure who to trust---in the current world or from the future. I especially loved seeing her live out aspects of her future life and finally experiencing the whole timeline so she can make sense of it all (and, of course, that's when we understand the full story as well). It's interesting because some of the conflict in the book is between Alice and her own future self, which presents her with some intriguing philosophical questions---should she trust her older (and therefore, assumedly wiser) self implicitly or should she follow her own current-Alice path? And then there are the moral questions of what she's willing to do in the present to stop a future atrocity. The book ended in a way I definitely wasn't expecting, which was a fantastic added bonus for a story like this. Sure there were moments when the story swooped into unbelievable places, but I still basically loved every minute of the roller coaster ride!!

***Disclosure: I received this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given and all opinions are my own.***

I Have read a couple from this author with I find when I do pick on of this author's novels up they are refreshing. I do not read alot of YA but I sometimes forget with the way they are written they are. It reaches out to anyone who begins to read with wrapping them up in what unfolds. A mystery is in place with that being a favorite. What she does find out I keep shouting encouragement at the character. Alice lol must be a little like Alice in wonder you know where I think if she is to come through. The suspense is spine tingling with quivers at times. With the Sci fi interwoven you flow through this one. You need the answers you need the future too.

I'm not going to lie. Malice by Pintip Dunn took me by surprise. The book takes my favorite YA tropes of Dystopian Sci-Fi, and Thriller and we come away with a really entertaining read.

Alice is just your typical teenager when a mysterious voice begins to tell her that if she doesn't do what it says, the world is essentially doomed. Oh yeah, and the voice is her, ten years in the future. Alice is of course skeptical at first, but as the voice shows her what would happen in the future, Alice realizes that the voice is telling her the truth and that if she can't figure out who is responsible for the virus and how to stop it, life as she knows it will end. Two thirds of the world's population is destroyed as the virus makes individuals allergic to the thing that brings life, the sun. Seriously diabolical. Alice's future self becomes increasingly desperate for Alice to try and stop the virus but can't tell her too much or it might end up changing even more things that it shouldn't. As more is revealed, Alice begins to creep into the consciousness of her future self and sees her soulmate and honestly, I lived for these moments.

I couldn't put this book down. I loved the twists and turns in the story and really didn't expect the thriller aspect to it which was fantastic. I mean, it is really obvious as to who could be responsible but there's enough twists to the story as to why, that it still casts doubt. You do have to suspend some disbelief when it comes to the time travel but I enjoyed it and plus, it's time travel. Who really knows how or why it works.

I loved Bandit. He's funny and goofy, and is really the comic relief in the book. The romantic side plot was on point and really sweet. It adds a lot to the story and was my favorite aspect of the book. The plot and pacing are well done and entertaining and I didn't put the book down until I finished the book. I am looking forward to reading more from this author and checking out her other books. 4.5 Stars.

This book was received from the Author, and Publisher, in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.

What if you saw a glimpse of your future? Would you try and change it?
This an incredible twisty time travel, dystopian thrill ride of a book.

Pintip Dunn’s, has done it again with her perfectly executed dystopian YA fantasy, Malice

Alice is just an ordinary girl, who happens to have one an extraordinary brother, Archie, a senior and science prodigy who likes equations and is ver anti social.

When a voice in her head starts telling her she needs to save the world. The voice calls her Malice. And, Malice, is the only way to stop a virus wiping out millions.

Alice knows the virus is created by someone at school, and this is were this page turner, dystopian with riveting shocking twist, makes you grasp the edge of your seat book takes off. I was completely glued to the pages holding my breath with elements of childhood drams and pulse pounding Romance.. I really enjoyed the mentioning of, Thai culture that I thought added some descriptive and notable dimension to this stellar storyline. This fast paced read tackles head first some anti-bullying issues, along with her exceptional three dimensional characters makes this book one of favorites so far this year

I went into Malice with a slight bias, but I'm glad that this book only cemented the fact that Pintip Dunn is my favorite author.
If you're a fan of well executed plot twists with Malice you're in for a treat. I found myself guessing along the way, only to be absolutely mistaken for the most part.
Dunn's leading ladies are always stellar, so I knew not to expect anything less. Alice was well developed, executed in a way that it was impossible not to feel for her. Bandit was one hell of a love interest, and the relationship between him and Alice was dynamic and fun to experience, their interactions as well. I have to note that all characters felt nuanced, I have a hard time picking who was my favorite.
I loved the world-building. The idea behind it all, the mechanics of the world were fun and unique. The story was engrossing, and the plot was paced to my liking. That, along with Dunn's writing style, made Malice hard to put down.
I recommend this book. I think it's an amazing addition to YA, and with it's perfect balance of sci-fi, romance and thriller, it's a book that you shouldn't skip.

You know me, I see Pintip's name on a book, I have to read it. Easy as that. And once more I wasn't disappointed! Perhaps this wasn't my fave--admittedly it's very hard to beat her Forget Tomorrow Trilogy--but it was still really, really good.

Pintip Dunn has a knack for dystopian worlds, as well as a way with words that simply grabs and pulls you in and won't let you go until the end. Alice was an interesting main character (we also happen to share a name which made it extra funny at times) and I really enjoyed reading her thoughts and seeing her emotions evolve and change, the way she handled certain situations and events.

The basic idea of a deadly virus threatening to eradicate most of the population isn't anything new, and yet Pintip found a way to make it different and fresh in her own style. This idea of basically having to make certain choices and sacrifices which ideally you wouldn't want to make yet it's either that or the end of the world, it was very interesting and makes you wonder what you'd do in her place. The suspense and mystery were really well done overall and there was only a bit of romance.

Overall I would certainly recommend Malice if you're looking for a suspenseful and thrilling read with a great main character and premise. And also if you're looking for this type of read that's a standalone instead of part of a trilogy or series.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Pintip Dunn for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this novel.

I really enjoyed reading this thriller about a girl who has to find out which one of the students at her school created a virus in the future that wiped out 2/3 of the population. It was well written and kept my interest until the end.

Characters:
Alice - the one who has to find out which one created the virus. She is given some clues about who the virus maker is but she has to figure it out on her own.

Bandit - One of the students in her school. He is probably my favorite character in the book. He starts off as egotistical but by the end he is everything I'd want in a soul mate haha.

I highly recommend this novel to everyone. It was fast paced and kept me guessing. There was one aspect that I was able to figure out but it still had some twists thrown in.

Malice has an intriguing blurb and that along with that awesome cover pulled me right in.
I liked the beginning, where the main protagonist was manipulated to tell a boy quite randomly that she loved him.
I also really loved the quirkiness of her brother and how different the siblings were.
The story was very enjoyable despite the way the future bleeding in to Alice's reality feels forced sometimes. I would have liked it to feel more realistic, as far as that is possible.

Overall, though, I really liked 'Malice', the heroine is likable and the premise - a virus developed by a boy killing millions - is as horrifying as it is fascinating.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for this eARC. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

While time travel books that change timelines can get confusing this one wasn't too bad. I liked that I wasn't lost with the concept of what was happening. Story had some twists to it. Alice was likable and not overwhelming of a character. She did what a typical teenager would do and nothing was over the top. Ending was not all tied up in a bow. Some of the characters' futures were not fully set and you didn't know which timeline they would follow. Overall it was a great read with a different spin on time travel.

I really wanted to love this book, the blurb had me so excited, and I did enjoy the plot but at times found the pace far too slow, certain points were a bit far fetched and too unrealistic for me to enjoy this book fully.

It was still an interesting read but just not quite what I’d hoped for before starting it.

The concept of this story intrigued me so much (your older self telling you someone in your school is gonna create a virus that'll kill two thirds of the population? you have to kill them before that? but you don't know WHO it is and also if you can completely trust your older self? how intriguing) and while I enjoyed reading it, I didn't think anything special about it. I liked the time travel et the mystery parts but others, not so much. The romance was a big focus and I understand it was important for the story, it felt too much for me. It was also not that hard to figure out who the mystery person was. I would have like more sci-fi and time travely stuff. It was still an interesting read.

📖 BOOK REVIEW⠀📚
BOOK: Malice
AUTHOR: Pintip Dunn
@pintip_dunn
Stars: 🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌
Published: February 4, 2020
Purchase on Amazon https://amzn.to/2U0pQYk

I finished this book in one day. Literally, could not put it down. The characters made you fall in love with them, root for them. But the mystery is both heartbreaking and almost impossible. I didn’t really see the ending coming, although as it got closer, I started to figure it out. I can’t say alot about this book except that it is one of the most compellingly written books I have read in a long time. I give 5 stars when I want to read a book again, and I DEFINITELY do!!!

Short Synopsis (abbreviate from Goodreads):
What I know: a boy in my school will one day wipe out two-thirds of the population with a virus.
What I don’t know: who he is.
In a race against the clock, I not only have to figure out his identity, but I’ll have to outwit a voice from the future telling me to kill him. Because I’m starting to realize no one is telling the truth. But how can I play chess with someone who already knows the outcome of my every move? Someone so filled with malice they’ve lost all hope in humanity? Well, I’ll just have to find a way—because now they’ve drawn a target on the only boy I’ve ever loved... 
*****
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Received from Netgalley.