“This
school was dangerous now. Scared people did scary things sometimes, even kids.
Sam knew that from personal experience. Fear could be dangerous. Fear could get
people hurt. And there was nothing but fear running crazy through the school.
Life in Perdido Beach had changed.
Something big and terrible had happened.
Sam hoped he was not the cause.”
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| wikipedia.org |
If you take the meat of
the classic novel Lord of the Flies,
add a dose of X Men, sprinkle in a
bit of Survivor, and stir in some LOST—your end result will be the
literary YA awesome sauce known as Gone
by Michael Grant. I guarantee it. Although Grant’s impressive series has not
received as much hype as its recent competition on the dystopian battlefront,
do not be deceived. This book is so epic it hurts.
One unsuspecting day, the
youth of Perdido Beach are shocked to find themselves in a most alarming
situation: the adults have all vanished and there are no clues as to where they
are or why it happened. Fourteen-year-old Sam Temple and his friends are just
as confused by the disappearances as everybody else, even more so when other
strange developments start to take place: the mysterious, harmful barrier that
has suddenly appeared around the
town, cases of mutated
animals running around, and kids with supernatural abilities thought only to be
possible for comic book heroes. Welcome to the FAYZ—Fallout Alley Youth
Zone—the name of the unexplainable new Perdido Beach claimed and ruled entirely
by kids.
But not everybody has
acquired these special forces, causing severe tension among the inhabitants and
a vicious struggle for power. Sam is among those blessed with these mysterious
powers, but no matter how much he tries to stay under the radar, he can’t help
but attract danger and attention. Merciless and brutal enemies emerge within
the community. Food becomes scarce and weapons become a necessity. Without
order or parents, there is only chaos, violence, and greed. Like many societies
before them, the FAYZ begins to regress into nothing more than a crucible of
darkness and corruption, and Sam must choose whether to save it from complete
destruction or stand back and fall down with it.
Personally, words cannot
even describe how fantastic Grant’s first installment of his spectacular series
is. Reading this book was like watching a high-packed action movie in my mind,
which for me, means that it’s completely awesome. This really is YA dystopian
fiction at its best, and there is just too much to admire in the ambitious and
wildly chaotic story Grant has written for us.
First off, Grant is
extremely skillful in characterization and differentiating between
perspectives. The book is told through multiple close
third-person-point-of-views, but never once could the reader ever mix up who is
speaking or thinking on the page. Sam is the hesitant leader. Astrid is the
cautious genius. Drake is the sadistic bully. Every character has their own
strengths and weaknesses, and the vast array of people showcased throughout the
novel are true examples of the kind of people we see today: the good, the evil,
the lazy, the corrupt, the weak, the strong, and more. It’s hard enough to tell
the story of one person, but Grant manages to achieve this flawlessly with the
ridiculous amount of characters he follows in the series.
Although some people may
write this off as youth-oriented literature, Grant writes with a very
intelligent and purposeful voice that adults can also enjoy. The story of the
FAYZ can be read as both an entertaining story as well as a comparison to the
inevitable errs of human nature and society all throughout history. There are
messages of power corruption, religion, social and political conflicts, racism,
brutality, and the difficulties of survival. It’s a very dog-eat-dog world in
Perdido Beach, and I appreciate it the most when Grant does nothing to
sugarcoat it in the least.
But this book is not only
about children surviving in a dystopian and murderous world. It also highlights
the everyday dramas teens face even if they aren’t situated in the hellish
environment of the FAYZ. Bullying is definitely the number one topic displayed
in this story and prevalent around the world today just as it is in the
literary world of the FAYZ. In this world, you see kids who are scared, greedy,
manipulative, jealous, and violent to the point of killing, but then again, you
also see kids who miss their parents and authority figures, experience crushes
and growing up, struggle with friends, and seek acceptance and popularity.
From my observations, Gone is part of a series that is
definitely both for adults and teenagers. I feel that any book that makes your
jaw drop, makes you feel sick, makes you question the things around you, or
just makes you think is definitely a book worthy of attention, and Gone certainly did it for me. So if you
are into super heroes and villains, find ninth graders with machine guns
fascinating, or are just interested with the philosophies of good versus evil,
then Gone is exactly the awesome
sauce you need.
Written by Janella Angeles
