London Eye by Tim Lebbon

I saw London Eye by Tim Lebbon while at the book store looking for book for my trip and thought, hmmm, that looks good. But, I am not a big fan of reading hardbacks while traveling. Hardbacks should be prized and kept on shelves where they can look pretty, not shoved in my back pack getting pushed all around. So I decided I would buy it as an ebook and give it a shot.
I was sold on the book when I saw a short ebook review saying London Eye is X-men meets Hunger Games. As I am a big fan of both of those, I just had to get it.

The cover looks like a standard dystopian/apocalypse cover. It uses a dark/dreary color scheme with two teens in the foreground and showing London in shambles in the background.

Now on to the review:
London Eye is a relatively short book, clocking in at 176 pages.
It starts out well, the main characters are Jack, a 17 year old boy, his girlfriend Lucy-Anne, and their two friends Sparky and Jenna. Jack, who was orphaned in a supposed terrorist attack two year before the start of the book is responsible for his younger sister Emily. At the beginning of each chapter there is a short news report from the attack from all the different news stations, BBC, CNN and a few others, showing the evolution of what was believed to have happened.
The premise of the plot is that the 'terrorist' attack is a cover up for something more sinister and these four teens are doing all they can to expose the truth, even if it means they have to enter the ruins of London by themselves. London is strictly quarantined, something that is enforced by the Capitol Keepers, soldiers who aren't afraid to use force.
We find out later in the book that it was a scientist releasing a biological agent as an experiment, but unfortunately it killed the majority of people in London that day. Those who were left were divided in to two groups, the Irregulars and the Superiors. The virus altered something in their brains but I can't say much more than that without ruining a big part of the plot. But rest assured, no zombies.

While London Eye is a pretty good book, it is rather anti climatic, there is no definite climax to the plot. I was left somewhat unsatisfied with the ending, it felt more like it could be the middle of a larger book rather than the end of this shorter book.

I would rate it a 3 1/2 out of 5 stars, it is a quick read and I will probably read the sequel, at least to see how it ends.

Similar recommendations:
The Society by Lilith Saintcrow: An adult novel, not dystopian but in The Society people do have powers. Its a bit of a stretch, but if you like reading about people with different abilities, it pretty good.

For the record, I had the perfect recommendation to go with this, I read it earlier this year, but now I can't find it on my goodreads. I will keep hunting for it and update this later!