It's hard to review this book because I was so immersed in it that I felt like I was living it. I was scared, I was heartbroken, I was cold when it snowed, I was in pain when the main character was hurt, I missed my parents; but I also loved my neighbors, felt joy at new growth, and loved the sunshine. To me that means that this was an amazing book. At one point while reading, I actually stood up to put my light jacket on and go to work when I said to myself, "Oh this isn't a warm enough coat when it is snowing outside". It was 60 degrees at the time, but it was snowing in the book. That's how in thrall I was while reading.
I loved the main character, Carrie. She was so good, loving, loyal, innocent and giving. I wish I was more like her. It made me wonder how I would react given the same circumstances. I will say that I'm still not sold on the main love interest - he is such a jerk at the beginning. I understand that he has gone through horrors in his life, but he is very cold-hearted at the beginning and I had a hard time getting over that.
I found the whole premise of the book a little scary because it felt like something that could really happen. A lot of the dystopian/post-apocalyptic books I have read have dealt with things like a pandemic, nuclear holocaust, alien invasion... This one simply had the dollar fail. There was a run on the banks - the banks failed. The government took over in a drastic way. Yikes! Maybe that was one of the reasons it was so engrossing, because it felt like something that could really happen to me and my family. Anyway, this was a great book and I highly recommend it. Now we wait for book 2, entitled Liberty , and it is being released on the 4th of July. Pretty cool. And I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the final book in the trilogy will be called, The Pursuit of Happiness .
Areas of concern:
When I bought this book for our library, I thought it was a Young Adult novel. The book does begin with the main character being 17 years old, but then it fast-forwards 5 years, so it is actually not a YA book. However, it kind of had a YA feel to it, and it was very clean, so I am not concerned about having it in the library. In fact, several students have read it and really liked it.
There is no bad language.
There is some talk of girls needing to sell themselves to keep their families safe, but it is done in as non-offensive a way as possible.
There are intense situations where characters fear for their lives.
There are corrupt and very scary government officials.
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