Scan barcode
A review by emilyusuallyreading
Panic by Lauren Oliver
3.0
What I Liked
These days, a young adult novel written in third person is difficult to find. And Lauren Oliver nailed this POV.
Panic is not a sci-fi, dystopian story. It's set in a real-world small town that is riddled with relative poverty and all the issues that come along with that. The characters living in Carp are realistic and tangible. Even the kindest characters have deeply-etched flaws. The character development in this novel is striking and intensely psychological.
I appreciated how Panic portrayed life in a poor, small town. Everyone is desperate and struggling, unable to get by and also unable to get away. $67,000 means everything to a teen who has no chance of a better future without some kind of stepping stone. Nat's story was perhaps the most compelling of the entire novel.
What I Didn't Like
Even though the intense depth of the characters in Panic was amazing, I never actually liked any of them very much. Instead of finding myself rooting for a winner of the games, I found myself distracted by the extreme selfishness and foolishness in every single character I encountered. There never seemed to be a pure motivation behind anyone's actions. I found myself irritated with Heather, Nat, Bishop, and Dodge more than I found myself rooting for any of them.
At times, the challenges seemed a little too extreme to be real, especially if this is an annual thing that police had never stopped before.
These days, a young adult novel written in third person is difficult to find. And Lauren Oliver nailed this POV.
Panic is not a sci-fi, dystopian story. It's set in a real-world small town that is riddled with relative poverty and all the issues that come along with that. The characters living in Carp are realistic and tangible. Even the kindest characters
Spoiler
AnneI appreciated how Panic portrayed life in a poor, small town. Everyone is desperate and struggling, unable to get by and also unable to get away. $67,000 means everything to a teen who has no chance of a better future without some kind of stepping stone. Nat's story was perhaps the most compelling of the entire novel.
What I Didn't Like
Even though the intense depth of the characters in Panic was amazing, I never actually liked any of them very much. Instead of finding myself rooting for a winner of the games, I found myself distracted by the extreme selfishness and foolishness in every single character I encountered. There never seemed to be a pure motivation behind anyone's actions
Spoiler
until Bishop announcing why he was judge, but even that caused extreme property damage and injury that the reader was basically supposed to ignoreAt times, the challenges seemed a little too extreme to be real, especially if this is an annual thing that police had never stopped before.