Feed by M.T. Anderson YP FIC ANDERSON

“We went to the moon to have fun, but the moon turned out to completely suck.”

Titus and his friends live on and for the Feed, a computer in their brains that from birth feeds them information and connects them to everyone, everything, and nothing. They can chat with their brains, watch video, look up any fact or figure in an instant, malfunction their brains for fun, and be fed ads tailored to their very thoughts. So why then are they all so bored?  Why does Titus feel so mal when he should feel meg? Who is this Violet chick coming off like she’s all brag and everyone else is so null?  And then when they all get hacked and Titus can’t access his feed for actual whole DAYS, what will he do? When he actual has for real feelings for Violet what will he do with them? What will he buy next?  

This is a viscously dark satire of the extremes of consumer culture and the vapidity of modern communication. It’s a dystopia as chilling and relevant as anything by George Orwell or Aldous Huxley. And it isn’t just a technophobic screed about “Those Darn Kids With Their Texting and the Whatnot” either. Adult society is also skewered well and full. The world of Feed is one where the planet is polluted beyond repair, war is ever-present and completely ignored, and mass violence is just another software glitch.  What makes this world so frightening is how little any of the characters in it care about anything that isn’t Fun and on the Feed.  Things like peoples skin falling off is just an everyday occurrence and they just buy more stuff to ignore it. Anderson shows a lot of the dark sides of a consumer culture.  There always has to be more stuff to buy to keep the machines of industry going, and when what we buy becomes who we are then a world like Feed becomes possible.

However, the characters aren’t all mindless drones to serve a big message for the author.  Anderson makes the major characters feel very real with believable limitations and drives, this makes the world he creates more real and more terrifying.  I also love that the character of Violet isn’t just there to Wake People Up and there isn’t a global conspiracy to unmask and no one successfully fights the feed and starts a global movement.  Violet’s just a girl that wants more out of life, but she has flaws and just wants to be happy like anybody else. Honestly, I think everyone should give Feed a chance. It’s not always fun, but it’s always darned interesting.  It tackles so many big ideas that it can be dizzying, but it never tells you what to think about it. I honestly think that it’s way more relevant than Brave New World or 1984 to most young people today and should definitely be on more High School reading lists.  Check it out for yourself.

You can check our catalog for Feed here.

Safekeeping by Karen Hesse YP FIC HESSE

Radley has come home to a country that isn’t her home anymore.  The extremist group the America’s People Party (the APP for short) has taken total control after the president was assassinated. They have established martial law and America is now a police state.  Radley is stranded with now useless credit cards, a cell phone with no charge, and no way to contact her missing parents.  When the police begin to search for her, she decides to try to make the long journey into Canada.  To make it she’ll have to live off the land, avoid gangs of marauders, evade the police and military, and sneak across the border.  Even worse she’s picked up a fellow traveler named Celia who needs Radley’s help to make it.  How can she take care of someone else when she can’t take care of herself?  Even if she makes it, is there anything left to hope for?

This book really has me split.  On one hand the writing is great, with excellent and simple prose that has a truly poetic quality and strong characters throughout.  Radley and Celia are great characters that grow and change realistically both as individuals and as friends.  I love the slow building of tension and the realistic nature of Radley’s once mundane problems becoming a matter of life and death.  They make the struggle of finding food and shelter come alive in way that is poignant and exciting, but never sensationalized.  I really like that Hesse ties Radley’s story to the people of Haiti, who Radley was volunteering with before coming back to America.  Not to be too political, but it’s nice that Hesse can point out that even in her nightmare scenario for America, there are places in the world even more dangerous and in needing of help.  Then what’s the other hand?  The background on the APP is pretty much nonexistent. We don’t really learn how they came to power, hold power, and eventually what causes them to lose power.  These details are glossed over.  It sometimes works because Radley has been away for a while and the focus is so much on her, and I’m truly glad there wasn’t loads of awkward exposition conversations, but there needs to be at least some idea of how this all happened.  Since there isn’t there is a lack of believability to the basic scenario.  Also, since Hesse doesn’t outline very well what the APP did to seize power and what they believe, some readers are going to think this is a blanket attack on conservatives.  Last but not least, I wasn’t blown away by the photographs and I wonder of the book really needs them.  All that being said, the strengths of the book are very strong and if you let yourself stop worrying about any plot holes then you will find a lot to love in Safekeeping. It isn’t as great as it could be, but it is a well written, emotional little gem.  I strongly recommend it to people that want a more thoughtful and personal type of dystopia tale.  

You can check our catalog for Safekeeping here.

The Only Ones by Aaron Starmer YP FIC STARMER

They were the only ones left.  No, but before that.  Before that it was just Martin, Dad, and the machine that hums.  Occasionally tourists came by.  Then they didn’t. Then Dad left.  Finally Martin realizes, he might not come back.  He leaves the island and realizes there’s a whole new world out there.  Unfortunately, it’s empty. Empty, except for a city of kids that are each exceptionally good at one thing.  They could build a paradise, destroy what’s left of humanity, or if the strange boy that talks to the animals is right, then the machine can bring everyone back. 

This is not another dystopia!  I know, I know.  The world has seemingly ended and almost everyone has vanished, but it still isn’t an apocalyptic dystopia. It’s a FABLE. It uses the fantastic to look at issues that are very real: alienation, love, devotion, grief, obsession, humanity’s meaning, civilization’s role, etc.  The best part is that it doesn’t ‘talk’ about issues, it uses that characters and plot to bring it out.  The book is really a mystery above all.  The plot just slowly goes forward, propelled by its unusual protagonist, Martin.  Since Martin knows so little about the world, the fact that it’s all but gone isn’t that terrible to him and that makes this NOT the usual dystopia.  Martin is kind of curious and aimless at the same time, so the plot seems to sort of zig-zag and putter along and you’ll often wonder, “What is this book even ABOUT!?”  Exactly.  That IS what the book is about.  Figuring out what the book is about.  If that seems like a snake eating its own tale…good! This book is about twisting your brain up and getting it all wrinkled.  It is about abandonment, a city of dangerously gifted children faith versus knowledge, time travel, and everything in between.  No one is truly the good or bad guys and you’ll often wonder if anyone will do the Right Thing.  Then you’ll wonder what the Right Thing is.  Then you’ll get a headache.  BUT if you read on and soldier through, you’ll meet loads of interesting characters, see a bizarre parody of human civilization through the eyes of kids, and be rewarded with a mind-twisting ending that pays off all your questions but doesn’t GIVE you the answers.  Unlike most mystery novels, this really is a puzzle and you’ll be very glad when you ‘solve’ it.  Not for everyone and quite unusual, The Only Ones is a rare treat for anyone that is a bit unusual themselves.  

You can check our catalog for The Only Ones here.

Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver YP FIC OLIVER

In a future where love is a disease Lena risked everything to FEEL something.  Then she lost everything.  She’s learned the price of love and run away from everything she has ever known.  She’s buried her old self and all her feelings.  Now she has a mission, but Lena is about to learn that you can’t bury yourself or your feelings and they’ll surprise ypu when you least expect it.

This is sort of funny.  I have the exact opposite problem with Pandemonium as I did with Delirium. In my review of Delirium I mentioned that it took too long to get started, the middle dragged, and that is picked up steam and the ending was powerful and surprising.  This book is much better in every respect, except for the ending.  I can’t get into details without spoiling it, but it just felt like they wanted a big surprise to go into the third novel.  So if you loved Delirium you may not love Pandemonium, but if you were lukewarm on Delirium, then you may quite like Pandemonium. I know, confusing. The novel splits into ‘now’ and ‘then’ segments. ‘Then’ is right after the end of the first book and tells us how Lena coped and got to ‘now’, where she is on her secret mission to subvert the Evil Government that Hates Love.  The back and forth works well to build tension and it drew me in.  Oliver, as usual, writes excellent prose, with great descriptions and dialogue.  I just still two books in wonder if dystopia was the best idea.  There are 332,862 dystopias published every month (give or take), so the Delirium trilogy seems to have way too much competition.  Again, I think this is a very good, but not great book in what is turning out to be a well written, interesting, and flawed series. This is definitely one of the better dystopia series and if you aren’t so tired of them that you are actually wishing the world would end, then give this series a shot.  Regardless, definitely read Oliver’s first book Before I Fall (I reviewed it here).  It’s absolutely excellent and truly unique.

You can check our catalog for Pandemonium here.

Daybreak by Brian Ralph

Daybreak

You are one of the remaining few.  Surrounded on all sides by the undead you rely solely on your new one-armed friend to guide you through the apocalyptic wasteland in the best first-person zombie comic of the year!

This book takes a rather sizable risk from the very first panel: it breaks the fourth wall.  Meaning a character looks directly into the panel and addresses the audience.  This is a first-person comic, so the main character (you) never speaks and we never see you.  This may strike some readers as gimmicky and I’m sure some people will prefer a hero we can see, but I loved the novel attempt to immerse the reader. The art is cartoony and unique. Ralph uses super thick and scratchy outlines and empty white space with just a few scratch marks for detail.  It makes for a look that is both cluttered and spare and fits very well for an apocalyptic look.  The characters for the most part are a bit stock to the zombie genre, but Ralph has a real sense of pacing and dialogue that had me care about the story anyways.  The one exception is your nameless one-armed guide.  He is a funny, unusual, and ultimately tragic figure that I found myself rooting for and missing whenever he wasn’t on screen. He is in many ways the hero of the story and the first person narrative is just a way to view things differently.  This isn’t going to be for all comic or zombie fans and it is a little on the short side, but if you want something truly different, take a risk with Daybreak.