A Review for Survive by Alex Morel

Posted by Jess

Release Date: August 2nd, 2012

Finished Date: September 12th, 2012

Publishers: Razorbill

Source: Bought

Format: Hardback

Pages: 272
Buy : Amazon UK / Amazon US

Hatchet meets Lost in this modern-day adventure tale of one girl's reawakening
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Jane is on a plane on her way home to Montclair, New Jersey, from a mental hospital. She is about to kill herself. Just before she can swallow a lethal dose of pills, the plane hits turbulence and everything goes black. Jane wakes up amidst piles of wreckage and charred bodies on a snowy mountaintop. There is only one other survivor: a boy named Paul, who inspires Jane to want to fight for her life for the first time.

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Jane and Paul scale icy slopes and huddle together for warmth at night, forging an intense emotional bond. But the wilderness is a vast and lethal force, and only one of them will survive.

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The Review: This had been on my wishlist for a long time. And when I finally ended up in Barnes and Noble during my New York trip, I saw it on the shelf and I bought it! 
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When I first read the synopsis to this book I wanted to read it. I thought it sounded intriguing, a new concept I hadn't read yet in the YA genre. It started off pretty good, Jane although she's a little messed up from her fathers suicide 4 or 5 years ago is easily likable. Alex Morel manages to transition us in slowly into Jane's story. I pretty much devoured the first half of the book, I honestly couldn't put it down. Paul, Paul is a great addition to the story, her and Jane remain the only surviers to the plane crash and so have to endure the cold and vastness of the open mountains. Although it isn't mentioned in the book you do get a sense that Paul has some experience with mountain climbing and survival skills in general, this pretty much added a good effect to the story with regards to actually surviving within the mountains.
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However having said that, I was hoping for lots of adrenaline, lots of thrills but I found it fell a little flat for me in that area. I was just expecting more than what I experienced as the reader. Don't get me wrong, the book does keep you reading, keeps you wanting but as for thrills and rush it doesn't really happen here. There's a love/hate relationship between Jane and Paul and it goes on for a few chapters until they realise they're all they have and eventually they fall in love. I was completely invested in them as a couple, really wished for a great ending, but unfortunately (this is where the book gets 3 stars for me) that wasn't to happen. I guess there is a happy ending if you want to look at it that way, but for me, I was disappointed with the ending to Survive. After going through everything with the two characters throughout, I found it a little dishearteninng to read the final chapter and epilogue and realise what the author had done. (Boy it's hard to write that without spoiling), so just for the ending alone I only gave this 3 stars. Had there been a different ending, had there been more andrenaline (which you would need to expect in a mountain surival story), had there been more rush to it I would have rated a little higher. 
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Nonetheless, Survive was a good story. It's witty, it's suspensful (just about), it's a tale of overcoming your inner demons and it's about hope and future. If you're looking for a quick read from a new author then pick it up, you may just like it more than me. But don't expect to be completely happy or satisfied with the ending.