Book Review: Gone

Gone by Michael Grant
Review by Meg

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SUMMARY: It is just a normal day at school. That is, until everyone over the age of 14 mysteriously disappears. All of the sudden, dozens of children are left without families, without supervision, and with new, inexplicable powers that they can't quite control. Chaos ensues as everyone tries to come to terms with their sudden ability to start fires, or suspend gravity, or move from one place to another in the blink of an eye. The arrival of new children from a school for ill-behaved rich kids throws everything further into insanity, as does the strange barrier that has appeared around town, keeping them from knowing what is happening on the outside. And of course, the threat of their 14th birthday looms over everyone's heads...

OPINION: While the plot is intriguing and will keep you hooked until the last page, this book did have some problems. The one thing that kept distracting me was that the 13-year-olds act more like adults than the children they are. The budding romances seem far too adult for a group of kids, as does the sheer evil nature of some of the antogonists. Are eigth-graders really capable of blackmaing adults or attempting virtual genocide? Additionally, there is an inexplicable "dark force" that is neither properly explained nor entirely logical, once the explanation for the state of the world is given. Overall, this book is a good read, but could have used some additional answers to make it truly excellent.