Monster

   Monster is a  Science / dystopian fiction novel written by Michael Grant, I first read it on the 25/12/2019 and have read it many times since.

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4 years after the treacherous FAYZ dome disappeared the people of the world have been living a peaceful and prosperous life until another meteorite strikes America, except this time there is no dome to protect them. The people exposed to the meteorite are gaining unprecedented powers, these powers lead to mass destruction and bold heroism. 

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A character that I found interesting was Adistrol Armisto (Armo). I found this character interesting because he is ODD (oppositional defiant disorder) and so does not listen to anything that anyone says so if someone wants to ask him something then they have to pose it as a question.  I found it interesting the way his friends had to think before telling him to do something, they gained compliance by asking a question instead, for example this conversation between Dekka and Armo about deciding which way to go. 

D  “Armo, go left, I’ll go right.”                                                                         A  “No, you go left”                                                                                            D  “Left is darker and you stand out more in the light”                                A  “Yeah, and?”                                                                                                 D “So, go left”                                                                                                    (long Armo silence and out thrust pouting lip)                                               D  “Ok which way do you think you should go?”                                           A  “I should go left, it’s darker”                                                                       D  “All right then, good idea”

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A key message that I took from the text was that sharing your problems with others makes everthing a lot better. For example when the main character, Shade had something that she was keeping from her friends, she was being all withdrawn. But then when her friend cruz got her to share it with everyone it made her feel a whole lot better. I can relate to this as when I have had problems at school and I didn’t share them with anyone It made me feel like there was no one there to help. When I shared them with friends and family I realised that it helped because they helped me overcome the problems and find solutions that I previously would not have found myself.

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Some challanges that characters had to deal with were, having to constantly be on the run from the seceret police(HSTF-66). I think that this would have been challanging because having to be on the run from anyone especially, the goverment would be very difficult as they would not be able to use and cell phones or their credit cards or any other form of communication. Also they were not able to trust anyone expect for their friends, they couldn’t even trust their own families. I personally can not relate to this as I have not been on the run from any form of law inforcement. I have also never had the experience of not trusting you family, but I would imagine that this would be very difficult not being able to trust the people who have been closest to you your entire life.

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The title of this text, Monster, is appropriate because the characters of the book are all injected with a serum turning them into different creatures. One of the main characters Shade Darby said  “There are three types of creatures, heroes, villains and monsters, I don’t intend to sit around and be a villain or a monster, I intend to be a hero”. But unfortunately there are other characters in the book who do not take the path of a hero, but instead choose to take the path of a Monster.

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I would recommend this book to ages 12 and older, because younger kids may not understand the content and it could be a bit disturbing for them. There are some scenes where characters are violently fighting, sometimes even resulting in innocent civilian death. I also think that younger readers may not want to read this as it is quite a substantial text and the language used is often quite advanced.