Level 2 -- Lenore Appelhans
In brief:
The more wordy version:
Felicia died shortly before her eighteenth birthday. Since then—she doesn't know how long it's been, though she's sure it's been much, much longer than her admittedly short life lasted—she's been in the same white room wearing the same white shift surrounded by the same group of girls. She occasionally spends time with a few of them—most show no interest in interacting—but mostly, she and the others stay in their personal pods, accessing and watching memories.
Enter Julian. He's the first guy who's ever showed up in Felicia's white world, and his appearance—and subsequent disappearance—coincides with things going blooey. And, CRAZILY ENOUGH, he and Felicia knew each other in real life.
Turns out that the afterlife that Felicia knows isn't what the afterlife is supposed to be: Julian is on the front lines of a rebellion against the angels in charge, and his people don't just want her to join up, they need her to.
Level 2 is both fast-paced and pulse-pounding, and those aspects of it are bound to appeal to readers who like their action sequences cinematic and their stories plot-driven. That isn't to say that Level 2 is only about the action—the shifts between Felicia's memories and her present are especially good—but the action is definitely stronger than the character development or the relationship arcs. There's a strong religion component—one of the prongs of the love triangle (yes, there's a love triangle) is devoutly Christian—and it's nicely done, in that his faith is just a part of who he is, rather than being shoehorned in to make a point of some sort. I'm especially curious to see where that part of the story goes.
There are a few cases of information being relayed in dialogue that feels unlikely and/or forced, and the end comes extremely suddenly—like, the sort of suddenly where it feels like the author said, "DONE NOW, I SHALL WIND THIS UP OVER THE COURSE OF THE NEXT FEW PAGES!"—but I'm certainly planning on reading the next installment.
Full disclosure: The author of this book is a book blogger; while we've never met in person or had much direct interaction online, her blog is in my feed reader.
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Author page.
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Book source: Review copy from the publisher.