Shift by Jeff Povey a review

shift
Meet Rev, Billie, the Ape, Johnson, GG, Carrie, the Moth and Lucas, a motley crew of bickering teens who find themselves totally alone in the world after a strange power surge hits their classroom during detention. With no answers as to why or how the rest of the world has disappeared, the mismatched group is soon facing a bigger nightmare than they could ever imagine…

Standing between them and the only way home are lethal duplicate versions of themselves, super powered teenagers who will kill anyone who gets in their way.

There is a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, a criminal, a stud, a narrator trapped in an empty world – with only their classmates and dark shadows of themselves for company.

However this is no coming of age tale, Shift is an apocalyptic, survival race, chase and mystery all rolled up in one.

Having worked with teenagers for over a decade now I think I can safely say that Jeff has captured a disparate group of teens’ inability to put their differences aside to work together to achieve their goals (survival, finding out what happened and escape) almost perfectly!

Shift twists and turns like a snake trying to escape a trap, it is a thrilling story that can be read on its own, but as it is the opening act in a trilogy it is set up to introduce the protagonists, overarching storyline and introduce the villains of the piece. I have no idea what will be happening in book two, but the way that Shift held me entranced I can hardly wait!

It is a story with multiversal appeal. If I only had one sentence to describe Shift in the hope of convincing you to pick it up, I would say:
 
It reads like Stephen King meets John Hughes… in the Twilight Zone!

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