Review: Delta by M.T. Zimny
Blurb:
Samantha Havardson still isn’t an Apex, but that’s about the only thing she’s sure of anymore. Her family and her identity have splintered and an immortal warrior named Adrestus is at fault. Now, Samantha must scramble to pick up the scattered pieces of her life while juggling high school and being the only kid on Apex Team without super abilities. Things only get more complicated when a cryptic message appears: NEW DELOS WILL BURN.
Samantha’s past continues to bleed into her present, getting in the way of friendships, sword practice, and final exams. While the city runs out of time, Sammy grows increasingly desperate to save the people she loves and her efforts just might land them in more danger than they were in to begin with.
“I’ll even let that dumb teacher come. First birthday in a thousand years, it’s literally the event of a millennium.”
Review:
First of all, I have to start this review by saying, “How dare you,” to M.T. Zimny for what she put me through. I read Delta during a buddy read that we hosted within the SFF Insiders Community Discord, which Zimny helped co-host. This opened up the ability for me to rant and rave at her on the fly, as well as ask questions as I made my way through this emotional roller coaster of a book. If you’ve never joined one of our interactive buddy reads co-hosted by the author, you really should. They are a lot of fun.
Okay, so let’s get down to business. If you felt like Beta was at level 10 for intensity, Zimny just laughed in your face as she cranked things to 11. Delta sets the stage for what is sure to be one hell of a finale in book three, Epsilon.
If you have been following my reviews for a while or engaging with me online, you know I’m a character-driven reader through and through. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good story and appreciate good world-building, but if I can’t connect with the characters, your book is dead in the water to me. Unlike Samanta, there is no bringing it back to life if your character arcs have no emotional depth.
Thankfully, once again, Zimny drew me in and not only helped me form deeper bonds with the original cast from Beta but also helped me build an emotional attachment to the new characters introduced in Delta. With that said, I’m going to go on record now and say that I will never, ever shed a tear for that jerk Anderson. Phew, okay, now that I got that off my chest, I will admit that the little twerp became much more tolerable this time around compared to book one.
Oftentimes, authors either focus the entire story on one character with blips of side characters that really have no arc to speak of, or they go the other direction and introduce a plethora of characters and arcs that start to feel unwieldy to keep up with.
I believe this is one of Zimny’s many strengths as an author. Not only does the pacing and introductions of new characters feel natural and spot on, but each character has the exact right amount of arc for their role in the story. This allows you to not only remember who they are but to actually care about them (minus that twerp Anderson; gosh, I want to push that guy in front of a bus).
If you haven’t guessed it already based on how Beta ended, this time around we get to dive deeper into Samantha's—or should I say Eydis's—memories. I’ll be honest, some of these are gut-wrenching to relive right alongside her.
I smiled in spite of myself. It was somehow comforting to think that whoever I was, Sammy, Eydis, or otherwise, I was and always had been a pain in the neck.
Of course, true to form just like in Beta, once again Zimny flexes her mastery of sleight of hand by taking us on more twists and turns. Some you will see coming, while others will misdirect you for an even greater twist. All will make you yell at the book, and some might even make you want to throw it.
There are so many great moments with the cast this time around, some that I promise are going to make you straight up laugh out loud to the point that those around you will wonder if you are okay. A particular bathroom scene is just one of many that will cause this gut reaction.
However, there are also going to be some jaw-dropping, gut-wrenching moments in the story later on that are going to break you. I won’t tell you the exact chapter, as I don’t want to spoil anything for you, but let me just say that if you are a fan of The Walking Dead series, this particular chapter will most likely elicit the same reaction you might have felt watching Glenn’s demise. Fun fact: Zimny shared with us during the buddy read that this particular chapter has gotten more upset reactions out of readers than anything else to date.
Actually, reflecting on that now seems like a good time to point out the world-building aspect of Zimny’s writing. Personally, I think Zimny should be teaching writing workshops for other authors on how to create a world with prose that draws the reader into the story in such a way that you feel like you’re sitting right next to the characters, breathing in the ocean air, coughing up the smoke from the fire, and sitting in shock at how someone managed to do something so stupid yet somehow win a competition in that manner. She does all of this without being overly flowery in execution.
It’s been a few months since I finished reading Delta (I know, I’m the world's worst reviewer since I dragged my feet to put my thoughts down on paper), but even now, as I work on this review, I can reflect back on New Delos in my mind and feel like I’m right there. The way Zimny describes the city, the landmarks, the crowds—all of it feels real and natural. It's as if her stories come to life in my mind, and instead of reading a book, I’m watching a movie. For me as a reader, it's very rare for an author to draw me in to the point where the story comes alive, but for those with the magical ability to unlock that part of my brain, well, they gain auto-buy status on my shelf and also gain someone who will champion their work to anyone who will listen.
All in all, once again I leave fully satisfied, emotionally destroyed, and eager to see where the series ends. I can promise you this: I will be returning to New Delos before the year ends so I can see how things play out in Epsilon. I’m excited to see if the theories I have swarming around in my head pan out, or if M.T. Zimny has used enough smoke and mirrors to throw me off and blindside me again with one last major twist.
