Dealing in Dreams

From the Publishers:

At night, Las Mal Criadas own these streets.

Sixteen-year-old Nalah leads the fiercest all-girl crew in Mega City. That role brings with it violent throwdowns and access to the hottest boydega clubs, but Nalah quickly grows weary of her questionable lifestyle. Her dream is to get off the streets and make a home in the exclusive Mega Towers, in which only a chosen few get to live. To make it to the Mega Towers, Nalah must prove her loyalty to the city's benevolent founder and cross the border in a search of the mysterious gang the Ashé Ryders. Led by a reluctant guide, Nalah battles crews and her own doubts but the closer she gets to her goal the more she loses sight of everything--and everyone--she cares about.

Nalah must choose whether or not she's willing to do the unspeakable to get what she wants. Can she discover that home is not where you live but whom you chose to protect before she loses the family she's created for good?

My Thoughts:

One reviewer said that this girl-power, dystopian YA novel is a mix of S. E. Hinton's classic, The Outsiders and Mad Max: Fury Road. I try not to read the publisher description, but I saw the bolded snippet of this review which meant that the whole time I was reading this book, I pictured Déesse, the matriarch of Mega City as Tina Turner/Aunty Entity, the ruthless leader of Bartertown in Mad Max: Beyond the Thunderdome. I do agree that Ms. Rivera does take a similar storyline to The Outsiders moved into a kind of future where girl gangs run the streets and drugs keep the masses "toiling." I think the premise is engaging, although as a YA reader who is not the typical audience of these authors, I need to be patient with the protagonist, Chief Rocka/Nalah, as she goes through her own identity crisis and social justice crisis. 

This is good for readers that are looking for Hunger Games kind of action.