October is "I Read What I Want!"
With so much required reading (off the clock of course), I get burned out. This month, I'm taking a little break and enjoying some titles I really want to read! *Mwa haa haa* That being said: These are pretty awesome books. Some are sequels that I've been anticipating for a long time!
It's always been Mason and his mom, he's never known his father. After a horrible accident as a child, his mother gives him a DVD of a man reading a children's book and tells him it is his father. This is the only link he has to the man.As he approaches his senior year in high school, Mason starts to ask more and more questions. Why does his mom hate TroDyne so much that she doesn't want him to pursue a scholarship opportunity? He doesn't need her anyway, just a copy of her signature to forge...but looking through her papers yields more secrets than he anticipated. There's some serious dirt here! His mom has a master's degree - and she used to work for TroDyne?!
Heading up to the rest home she works at, The Haven of Peace, he again finds more than he bargained for: there are kids here, kids like him...just staring off into space. What could have happened to them? A fight with his mom doesn't get him any answers, but the beautiful blonde girl has his full attention. On a whim, he plays his DVD for her, the one with his dad reading. Against all odds, she suddenly wakes up! Can this be happening? She doesn't seem to know how she got here or who she is, but she does know one thing: she needs to get away from here before the Gardener realizes she's awake.
Dazed and confused, Mason plays the hero and kidnaps this strange girl with the help of his friend. They make their way to his cabin to decide their next move, and discover that maybe there's something to her claims. Someone is definitely following them...
They run to Seattle to ask a former TroDyne employee what she knows, but nothing could prepare them for what she knows. First off, the "girl" (as they had been calling her) is named Laila. Second, TroDyne developed a project to solve the inevitable hunger crisis: humans who don't rely on food, or autotrophs. Worst of all? Laila's one of them. This beautiful girl in front of him isn't really human...and the Gardener is hardly going to let one of his subjects just go free. There's too much at stake. Who is the Gardener? Can Mason find a way to help Laila escape them, and free the others under TroDyne's control?
Fast paced, and a quick read, Bodeen has another winner. Raises some interesting questions about environmental issues and ethics, which could spur some interesting debate. How far is too far? Decent sci-fi for middle school and up.
"'The arrival of the Gardener was met first with the trembling, then with a shared stirring, as if we were all awakening at once. We knew the arrival meant the stimulating part of our existence was about to occur.The Gardener moved to the front; the odd accompanying squeaks were familiar sounds to me. In anticipation, my heart beat faster. I waited for what I needed. Craved. Desired. And then, with a loud clank, the Gardener pulled the switch up front, and the light came.'God, it was so weird, like she was watching a movie, narrating it. I glanced around to see if anyone noticed. A woman and a little kid were looking at books nearby, but they weren't paying any attention to us.'As one, our heads turned upward to the false sun. A murmur rose, like one big satisfying Ahhhhhhh....'" (Bodeen pg. 111, 2010).
If you liked this, check out:
Bodeen, S. A. (2010). The Gardener. New York: Feiwel and Friends.
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