If you haven’t read Genesis Girl, the first book in the BLANK SLATE set– stop right now, and go read it.

After you’ve done that (and I don’t think it will take you long, because it consumes you until you’re finished), you can come back and read this review about the second book of BLANK SLATE.

Here’s what Goodreads has to say about Damaged Goods:

Blanca has everything she ever wanted, a hot boyfriend and the loving support of her foster father. She’s finally escaped the abusive control of her birth father and her tortured childhood at Tabula Rasa School.

But the scars of Blanca’s Vestal upbringing run deep, especially when the FBI start asking questions.

Blanca feels abandoned by her boyfriend, who is hunting for Lilith, Blanca’s only blood relative. The Defectos, a support group of Vestal-Rejects, offer Blanca comfort which she readily accepts.

While the Vestal order crumbles, Chinese rivals, the Guardians, rise to power and wrest control of important Tabula Rasa contacts. As Blanca’s life is thrown into chaos once more, she struggles to recognize friend from foe, and one miscalculation can have devastating consequences.

This sequel to Genesis Girl sucked me in, fast. Thanks to having a sick day, I read the majority of this book in one setting, and I’m so glad I got to do just that.

I loved the questions that were answered in this book, the ones we were left with after reading Genesis Girl, and I loved the twists and turns this sequel took us on. The twists, in the end, that were presented might have made me gasp out loud.

The biggest thing I love about both of these books is the big idea it presents with the Vestals. A community of kids being raised in a hunkered-down school that is technology free does not feel like it’s something too far off from our future. In fact, all the ideas that Bardsley presents gives a person pause, considering the technology age we live in today.

I love Blanca’s character and how she struggles with not wanting to be a brainwashed Vestal, but still hold true to the way she was raised without the burden of too much technology.

The only thing that left me a little puzzled were the questions we didn’t get answered in this book, which makes me hope/hanker for a third book.

If you haven’t read these books, I’m very serious: Go. Now.