AUTHOR: Alex London
RELEASE DATE: June 2013
PUBLISHER: Philomel Books
PAGES: 379 pages
GENRE: Science Fiction
OVERALL RATING: 2/5
APPROPRIATE AGE: grades 8-12 (language)
SUMMARY: Knox is a playboy, he likes to party, loves the girls, and never gets in trouble. When he steals his dad's car, takes it off autodrive and crashes, instantly killing his passenger, there is no punishment for him. Instead, Knox's proxy Syd is the one who receives the punishment. As Knox watches; Syd is tied up, electrocuted, branded and punished to manual labor in a work camp... all for something a kid he has never met did. So what happens when by some small chance, Knox and Syd finally meet?
FAVORITE QUOTE: "He laughed at himself for thinking about Mr. Baram's weird saying and picked up an ancient plastic pen that had rolled out of one of the bins. He mindlessly clicked the back of it to make the little tip go in and out with a satisfying sound. Why did they even have this antique? Who knew how to write by hand anymore?" (London, 43)
WHAT I LIKED/DIDN'T LIKE: I was not a big fan of this book. The high-tech dystopian society was kind of cool. But it seemed like there were a lot of questionable gaps. The beginning of the story would mention one thing and you would have to wait till several chapters later as to find out why. I never felt any bond toward the characters. It's not like I was tearing up when a character died. Another thing that really bothered me was the language. You would think in this futuristic world, they would come up with new curse words. The author created several new terms, but still felt the need to add curse words so that I don't feel comfortable allowing my middle grade students to read the book.
WHAT I LIKED/DIDN'T LIKE: I was not a big fan of this book. The high-tech dystopian society was kind of cool. But it seemed like there were a lot of questionable gaps. The beginning of the story would mention one thing and you would have to wait till several chapters later as to find out why. I never felt any bond toward the characters. It's not like I was tearing up when a character died. Another thing that really bothered me was the language. You would think in this futuristic world, they would come up with new curse words. The author created several new terms, but still felt the need to add curse words so that I don't feel comfortable allowing my middle grade students to read the book.
READALIKES: Red Rising by Pierce Brown, The Eye of Minds by James Dashner
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