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books

Decelerate Blue by Adam Rapp and Mike Cavallaro

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decelerate blue rapp cavallaroIn Rapp’s and Cavallaro’s dystopian near-future, everyone lives their life at high-speed. There’s no time taken for reflection and everything is always go-go-go. In fact, everyone is supposed to say “go” when they’re done talking to indicate that it’s time for the person they’re talking with to reply. It’s not strictly illegal to leave out the “go,” but it’s more serious than a social faux pas (like forgetting to say “please,” for example). Everyone reads abridged versions of classic novels in school, and beds are made upright. This world is more than just annoying, though: it’s a surveillance state, and the government punishes people for not living up to the hyper-efficient ideal, seen most alarmingly when protagonist Angela’s grandfather is sent to a “reduction colony” when his heart rate drops too low for too prolonged a time.

Angela is tired of living this way – and she learns a few others are, too, when she’s recruited into a resistance whose sole purpose is to deliberately slow things down, to dismantle this enforced way of life. The resistance lives underground, unplugged, and they have their own speech patterns, too – they refuse to use contractions, creating an immediately recognizable difference when reading the resistance sections versus the above-ground sections. The resistance, now with the help of Angela, are hatching a plan to make this sort of life possible for others on the outside, too.

The concept is intriguing, and I think a lot of teens will immediately find it relevant to their lives. Parts of the world-building seem like a stretch (upright beds?), but people said that about The Handmaid’s Tale too, and look where we are now. The story’s rhythm takes a while to get used to, mainly because every character really does end their sentences with “go” or eliminate contractions, so no one character really talks like we talk now. Cavallaro’s art is mostly black and white, with some spots of color during particularly emotional or important sections of the story. There’s a nice romance between Angela and a fellow female resistance fighter, and the “decelerate blue” of the title comes into play in a literal and shocking way at the end.

Decelerate Blue is a good question-raiser, even if its themes aren’t explored fully. It’s not a super long graphic novel, and it packs a lot of story into its roughly 200 pages. Somewhat ironically, I wish I could have lingered a little while longer in Rapp’s and Cavallaro’s future world, both the government-controlled one and the resistance, to get a more immersive experience and feel a greater connection to the characters. It felt like the story was sped up a bit, and then it was over too quickly, though the open ending is fitting. This is a good pick for teens who aren’t tired of dystopias yet – and we may actually see a resurgence of interest in this subgenre considering the current climate in this country.

Review copy received from the publisher. Decelerate Blue is available now.

Graduation Day by Joelle Charbonneau

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 Graduation Day is Joelle Charbonneau’s conclusion to her trilogy that began with The Testing and continued with Independent Study, and I’m disappointed I didn’t enjoy it more. The Testing and Independent Study were both exciting, edge-of-your-seat page-turners, full of action and plot twists. Graduation Day felt lackluster in both action and twists – not enough action and a few too many twists.

After the events of Independent Study, Cia is determined to get rid of the Testing once and for all. She can’t do it alone – she must partner with some of her classmates, including those who killed other teens during the events of the first book. She’s also asked to carry out a special assignment by the president, who claims that she, too, wants to abolish the Testing. But what are her true goals? Who can really be trusted?

I think what I missed most were the actual tests that pervaded the first two novels. They were clever and cruel and tremendous fun to read about. The tests were where Charbonneau’s imagination was at its best, and they were also a great way for us to get a feel for how characters behave in very tough situations. Graduation Day sacrifices these tests in favor of a more straightforward plot where Cia investigates who really wants to get rid of the Testing and what each person’s motives truly are. I say straightforward, but that’s really only true initially. By the end of the story, we’ve gone through at least three double-crosses, and I was never quite able to wrap my mind around who did what and why. It’s more than a little muddled and grew tiresome after a while.

Beyond my frustrations with the plot, I felt like many of Cia’s actions were out of character. I can understand that she would resort to more drastic measures here than she would have in the first book, but the way she reacts to certain events, the things she says – they often seemed a little off. I can’t go into much detail without revealing major plot points, but what I can say is that Cia didn’t always resemble herself from the previous two books.

Whereas I read the first two novels almost straight through in one or two sittings, this one took me several days, and I never counted down the minutes until I could pick it up again. The final confrontation, which I was hoping would be a big showdown with more secrets revealed, instead felt anticlimactic. This is obviously a must-read for diehard fans of the first two novels, but it’s not a completely satisfying conclusion, and I was left feeling a bit let down.

Review copy received from the publisher. Graduation Day is available now.

Independent Study by Joelle Charbonneau

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In The Testing, Cia underwent a series of grueling tests, ending in a Hunger Games-esque survival test that she and a few of her classmates made it through. Then, as is standard with the Testing, all of their memories were wiped, and they were simply told they had passed.

Cia is now a freshman at the university, having successfully passed the Testing, but she remembers nothing of it, at least initially. That means she remembers nothing of what she had to do to pass, and nothing of what her classmates did to each other, either. But she is not home-free yet. She still has rigorous classes which come with their own more standard tests, plus a series of more creative tests that will gauge her creativity, smarts, and ability to work with others. And then she’s assigned to the independent study of the title, which comes with its own surprises and challenges.

Meanwhile, Cia also has the nagging fear that not all is what it seems, and she slowly begins to take notice of an undercurrent of resistance – and it’s pulling her in.

While the first book was an edge-of-my-seat thriller, the sequel is more of a puzzle book. The stakes are still high, but Charbonneau focuses on a series of smaller puzzles rather than a large-scale survival trial. The puzzles are clever, too, both in the way they’re set up by the puzzle-makers and the way they’re solved by Cia and her comrades. Reading about these things is incredibly fun – I found myself thinking “oh, how cool (and also awful)!” several times. This series is full of terrible things happening to children, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me miss school a little bit. (Honestly, I could have just as easily said “High school is full of terrible things happening to children” and it would be just as accurate.)

There’s a whole heck of a lot of dramatic irony in this volume, as Cia and her cohorts’ memories have been wiped, but the readers’ have not (obviously). We know all about the betrayals that went down in the first volume, so for a good portion of this sequel, I was holding my breath, just waiting for other similar betrayals to happen here. I was glad that Charbonneau didn’t give me exactly what I was expecting.

For all its positives, Independent Study requires a bit more suspension of disbelief than its predecessor. For example, instead of a recorder in the students’ ID bracelets (as in the first volume), the adults in charge of their education/tests opted for a simple tracker. This allows Cia and some other students to talk freely, which is necessary to the plot. The problem is it makes no sense for those in power to decide they only need to track the students’ movements and not their conversations. It’s such a blatant plot contrivance and it bothered me.

Independent Study wraps up the main plot points introduced in the book, but it does end on a cliffhanger, as many second volumes do. If this bothers you, I advise you to wait until the third and final volume, Graduation Day, is published in the summer.

Review copy received from the publisher. Independent Study will be available January 7.

Son by Lois Lowry

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I put off reading Son for a long time. The Giver is one of those book that holds a special, partly sentimental, place in my heart. I was just the right age for it when I first read it – right around Jonas’ age – and it was a revelation for me. It was the first dystopia I ever read. I was entranced. I still am. As an adult, I can see the plot holes, and if I had not read it first as a child, I most likely would not be as forgiving of its faults. But that doesn’t matter. This is a book that speaks to kids first and foremost. Each time I pick it up and dive in, I remember what it was like to be 12 years old and read that book for the very first time. It’s something akin to a feeling of transcendence.

Reading sequels to books like that as an adult can be challenging. I remember finding Gathering Blue as a young teenager and loving the discovery I made, all on my own, that it was connected loosely to The Giver. I felt that sense of wonder again, though not as deeply. As an older teen, soon after graduation from high school, I picked up Messenger, knowing it was the third in that set of books. Alas, I was disappointed with it. I wonder if I had grown too old for this very particular kind of story, or if the book simply wasn’t as strong. Possibly both.

All that long introduction is to say that I’m of two minds about Son. While reading it, I had flashes of those transcendent moments I felt as a child, but I also felt disappointment and, at times, tedium.

It’s divided into three sections: Before, Between, and Beyond. The first part focuses on Claire, a child who has been assigned to be a birth mother in the same community Jonas lived in. This is the section most similar to The Giver, and it is by far the strongest. The second part follows Claire to another place reminiscent of Kira’s community in Gathering Blue. The third and final part follows her to the setting of Messenger. As the final volume in the series, Son’s structure functions as a very literal way of tying everything together. Unfortunately, drawing such close parallels between Claire’s story and Kira’s in the second part and Matty’s in the third part also subjects it to the same criticisms of those stories. This is especially true for the last third, which suffers from multiple weaknesses I also felt were present in Messenger. If anything, the third part actually builds upon those weaknesses, diving too far headlong into strictly metaphorical territory and sacrificing a logical plot with concrete explanations.

I’ve gotten a lot of feedback about Son from adults, but not much from kids. The book isn’t wildly popular in my library, though it’s not a shelf-sitter either. I wonder how kids who have read the other books feel about it. If you’ve gotten feedback from kids, I’d love to read about it in the comments.

Like in all the previous books, the language is beautiful and strange at at the same time. It’s the type of writing that is simply stated but resonates more strongly because of its simplicity. I expect it is divisive among adult readers who had differing interpretations of the ambiguous ending of The Giver. I expect it is also divisive simply because it is not The Giver, and I’m not sure anything can be. It’s still lovely and different and certainly worthy of acclaim. It’s imperfectly done, but we should all be glad it exists.

Finished copy borrowed from the library.

The Testing by Joelle Charbonneau

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Cia lives in Five Lakes colony, the region of the country that used to be the Great Lakes, but is now a blighted region thanks to the Seven Stages War, a terrible conflict that killed millions and left most of the world environmentally destroyed. The United Commonwealth is now focused on revitalizing the country, clearing out the deadly toxins from the water and forcing the Earth to grow food again. 
To do this, the country needs leaders. When they graduate from school at 16, all children become eligible for the Testing, a series of rigorous tests that determine entry into the the country’s (apparently only) college. Cia is one of the select few chosen to compete. She has no choice in the matter, but she’s happy to go; she knows it’s the only way to get into college and she’s eager to help lead the healing of the Earth.
But the Testing is not what it seems. Before she leaves, Cia’s father – who participated in the Testing – tells her that though all participants’ minds are wiped of memories of the Testing to ensure no inside information can be given to others, he’s been plagued by disturbing half-memories. He remembers violence, death, terrible things children did to each other. He warns Cia not to trust anyone. He tells her that most people who go to the Testing – the ones who don’t pass – aren’t ever seen again.
So, does this synopsis sound familiar to you? It should – it’s basically the Hunger Games. And I don’t mean that in the way Divergent or Legend are like the Hunger Games. Those two books certainly have strong similarities, but The Testing takes it to a whole new level. The bulk of the book involves, unsurprisingly, an arena-like test where the teens must make it from one part of the blighted country (human-made obstacles included) to another, and only a certain number who make it will be admitted. They quickly learn that it’s to their advantage to thin the herd. There’s also another boy from her colony who Cia may or may not have a crush on, but can she trust him? Is his affection just a clever ruse?
I think it’s interesting that Kirkus (usually the more unforgiving of review journals) claims that Charbonneau “successfully makes her story her own.” I don’t agree with that statement completely. It’s not a carbon copy, but the aspects that are similar are eerily similar, in a way that seems to verge worryingly close to theft. I realize this is a pretty strong statement, and I thought a long time about how I’d remark on it. I felt it was important to share, though, so there you have it.
Despite all of that, though, this is a fantastic book. I know. If the Hunger Games didn’t exist and I’d never read it, I’d be shouting this book’s praises all over the place. But the Hunger Games does exist, I have read it, and The Testing owes so much to it (including its very existence, most likely). We don’t read in a vacuum, and I can’t and shouldn’t pretend that we do. But I also feel it’s important to judge a book on its own merits without necessarily comparing it to something else, and on its own, this book is fantastic.
Actually, I liked it more than the Hunger Games, which I enjoyed but didn’t love immediately. I found the premise of the Hunger Games a little harder to believe and its depiction of the terrible things adults force upon the children in their care a bit heavy-handed. The Testing couches its violence in something that I think is more immediately relatable to teens – the competition for admittance to college – and shows the consequences of what we do to our children (intentionally or not) in a slightly more nuanced way.
Enough with the Hunger Games comparisons, though. The Testing affected me in a visceral way, and I can honestly say that no other book in recent memory has gotten my heart rate going quite like this one has. I resented having to go to work in the morning because all I wanted to do was read this book. Charbonneau is a master of suspense, of creating tension so taut that it hurts to keep reading but hurts just as much to stop. I wanted to turn the pages faster, faster, but at the same time I had to force myself to slow down because I didn’t want to miss a single word. This is the kind of book that makes readers bite their fingernails until their fingers bleed, tug bits of hair out, shout at their significant others to leave them alone because goddammit they are reading, can’t you see?
Beyond that aspect, there are some truly creative things going on here. I found the tests prior to the main survival round hugely interesting and quite unique in their own right, particularly the third round one involving teamwork. It’s a great example of some creative plotting as well as character-building, and is the first real opportunity we get to see how ruthless children can be. The way Charbonneau gradually moves the tests from completely innocuous to more and more sinister is masterfully done.
The Testing does have its weaknesses. Cia isn’t a hugely memorable character (though neither is she flat). There’s not much background about the Seven Stages War, which is something that frustrates me in any dystopia I read. Some elements of the plot are easy to see coming – betrayals, alliances, deaths. Still, Charbonneau throws in enough twists to keep readers thoroughly engrossed, and like I mentioned before, it’s nearly impossible to stop reading it once you start.
So, obviously, this is a perfect book for your fans of the Hunger Games and other action-packed dystopias. I’d love to discuss it with other readers and get their views on its similarities. This is one I see people having very strong reactions to one way or the other. For myself, I’m really looking forward to the sequel.
Review copy received from the publisher. The Testing will be published June 4.