Likeness by Sheri J. Kennedy
A Fiction Novel published by FreeValley Publishing (10/05/15)
Summary:
“Funny how repetition of form brought ease and felt pleasing, but complete symmetry fell short of the mark for perfection.” (Page 12).
An all week case of the Mondays for Emmaline turns into an adventure of philosophical proportions. An assignment for an ad campaign for the newest drug, Assimilaire, has Emmaline creating a proposal where she has unwittingly made an idealized version of herself and her friend the brand-builder Charlie. The big wigs warm to her idea and send Emmaline and Charlie off to the cameras to star in the ad themselves. It’s a big hit all around and they are then sent off to the WWPA con for a live show and to receive awards for their great work. Staying at the Milieu midtown, Emmaline and Charlie learn some startling things about Assimilaire and what it really can do in a crowd.
Keywords:
Assimilate, Extroverts, Drug, Bomb Scare, Likeness, Similarities, Convention, Philosophy, Conversations, Difference, Becoming Another, Identity, Losing Self
My Review:
Emmaline. What an incredibly classic yet fun name. I absolutely loved this name and loved that it was the first word of the book. Emmaline herself, however, isn’t as easy and fun as her name. Some of the things she does and thinks are easy to grasp and delightful, like the way she keeps her ‘girl shoes’ ready at work and tromps to and from work in her boots. The way her mind thinks and the words she uses is a bit hard to get into. She thinks in a slightly different dimension than I do and even though she’s in Seattle and there are references to Seattle I am not as familiar as I should be and some of the references are lost on me.
Likeness is an interesting book and a great fiction read for the more philosophical or psychological leaning reader. What does it mean to have an individual personality that is apart from the masses and what does it mean to fit in with the norm or to be like a prominent figure are two questions that are picked apart in this book.
Much of the book spent time on the question of ‘likeness’ or ‘sameness’ and the meat of the story was not divulged until halfway through the book. It is only halfway through that the true plot is revealed, the buildup to this point didn’t have as much tension as the latter half of the book. It could be argued that the plot of the story was the understanding of the concept of Likeness but for a fictional novel, the true plot didn’t pick up until after Emmaline and Charlie were at the conference. Therefore much of the beginning half of the story was spent on character building and environmental descriptions.
This novel was published by FreeValley Publishing on October 5th, 2015 and is available on Amazon here.
TL;DR Star Rating: 4.00
Links for more information:
Rachel Author Barnard 
Thanks for the review Rachel!
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