Gone

Great plot. Well written. Everybody over the age of 15 disappears and from newborns to 14 have to mend for themselves. As usual there are bullies, wild animals and some supernatural power. At times, it was frustrating but you have to put your mind set that these are kids and they are trying to survive. I did enjoy reading this book.

Pros: good pacing, lots of action and plot twists, interesting and realistic (if sometimes infuriating) characters

Cons: I wanted the kids to do the smart thing - rather than the right thing; because a lot of the actions taken are adult, I kept picturing the kids as being at least 16 when the protagonists were actually 14

For Parents: good for reluctant and/or weaker readers, no sexual content but a fair bit of violence and some racial slurs

It's school as usual for Sam until the teacher disappears. It doesn't take the kids long to discover that everyone in Perdido Beach over 15 is gone. There is now a barrier they can't cross enclosing a 20 mile radius and powerful bullies are setting themselves up in positions of power.

And some of the kids are acknowledging they have strange abilities.

Gone has an excellent mix of characters. There are bullies who manipulate with words and others who use violence. There are decent people who want someone in charge who will keep order, who don't want to be the one in charge. There are cowards and heroes, kids who are responsible, kids who are victims. I thoroughly hated a few of them, particularly Quinn and his use of racial slurs.

It was easy to forget that the protagonists were all 14 or under. While there was one real psychopath in the book, most of the kids were adverse to killing - even when it was in their best interest (I find it frustrating when characters in books don't get their comeuppance. In life I'd never urge a 14 year old to kill another kid, but in a book you want to good guys to win and the bad guys to die, not come back in the next book to make things hard for the good guys again. On the other hand, it's a better message for kids that they shouldn't kill, so the author did the right thing).

The pacing was great. For a 550 page book, it's a quick read. There are numerous plot twists and the cause of the disappearance is explained in a rational manner.

Great for adults who want a quick, entertaining read, or kids who want a good story. There is some violence but I don't remember any swearing and there's no sexual content.

I read this book when I was a lot younger and I just remember how it really scared me as a kid. SPOILER - The girl getting hit with a bat being the most memorable part of the book for me. Now that I'm older I'm interested in finding books that are scary and when I started to read this and found that part to be less scary although as I continued to read a lot of the parts began to give me chills. SPOILER - for example the kids that slow-mowed the boy disappearing, and seeing that it was a monster terrifying looking thing yet he was greeting it with a warm hug. That definitely was like wow chills for me aha. I really enjoyed the book and I'm excited to read the next one.

This was definitely an interesting, but long read. World building is a funny thing because in establishing the plot its very easy to lose a reader in the details. That's what happened here, especially during the first 200 or so pages of the book. I wanted something to happen, but the author was busy world building or setting up characters to move the plot forward. Once the action happened, it was grotesque and nonsensical at times, but well worth the wait. Released around the same time as The Hunger Games, Gone went where The Hunger Games seemed scared to go. Mass death of children, truly sociopathic characters, egotism running rampant, and answering the question of what really happens when you leave a bunch of reckless kids in a society with no adults. Fans of I Am Number Four, The Hunger Games, dystopia, or fantasy novels will have their hands full with this one if they can manage to get past some of the dryer chapters.

I wish I had gone poof!

OK, maybe that was a bit dramatic. I don't REALLY wish I had gone poof like all of the adults in this town. However, the reality of it is that I didn't enjoy Gone as much as everyone else who has given this book awesome ratings and glowing reviews.



I finished Gone a long time ago and I wasn't sure if I wanted to review it or not. There are over 20,000 five star reviews on Goodreads alone and I didn't feel like my review would contribute to anything.



Yeah, but I cave and now I review.



One very normal day, everyone aged 15 and up disappear. They literally just blink out of existence, leaving everyone aged 14 and under to fend for themselves in this small town in California. This is where the book takes on a very Lord of the Flies on steroid approach seasoned with some Heroes (TV show) and garnished with some Stephen King.

To say this book had a lot going on is an understatement. I think perhaps it had too much going on but even then the theme wasn't that hard to follow. You did have to wait a long time for anything to happen because the pacing in this book was very slow. Because you are constantly being introduced to new characters you don't really get to know any of them, keep up with them or care about them too much. Sadly, I was OK with that. Yes, a world without adults could get very chaotic. It was scary to think there were that many kids who were power hungry and flat out psychotic. I wasn't totally immune to the horrible things that took place in Gone, it's just that I was intrigued by all the crazy sci-fi stuff being thrown in.

The two major issues I had with the book were:

1. Heavy, heavy, heavy Christianity.

2. The non stop derogatory terms being used by one character in regards to one of the major characters in the book.

Let me make something very clear. I'm not bashing religion. NOT AT ALL. I'm very spiritual and not very religious for very personal reasons. However, I find beauty in EVERY religion. I'm also not against religion being in fiction. In fact, one of my favorite books is By the River Piedra I Sat and Wept by Paulo Coelho and I plan to read all of his books. The religion in this book just felt out of place. I feel that I can't go into much detail without offending someone. Simply put I didn't think that teenagers and children like the kids in this book would speak about God in the way they did. The prayers and the talks about punishment by God included in the book felt more like the author's agenda than that of children who are supposed to represent the majority of children reading the book. The little bit of background given on the characters didn't allow me to even try to pretend that they spoke like this on a norm. Believe me, I went to Catholic grade school and high school. Kids don't talk like this.

With that said, it totally irritated me that there was one character that kept using derogatory terms when speaking to one of the other major characters. Clearly, a strong theme in the book was one of good vs evil. Yet the “good” guy kept using these words when speaking to his friend. I didn't understand why it was necessary to include this language. What purpose did it serve? If you've read the book and you know why, please enlighten me.


On a serious tip...These two points bothered me so much that I jumped online and searched reviews on Goodreads to see if anyone else had mentioned the things about this book that rubbed me the wrong way. Can you believe that not one person mentioned anything at all about these things? OK, I just found one that spoke on the derogatory comments.

I don't know. Maybe I'm too sensitive... Nope, I don't think that was it.

I am going to close by saying that there are some books you need to read yourself and I have found that there are others that I'm OK with someone just telling me about it. I'm good with being told about the rest of this series. I read this book with my son and although he felt the same way I did about pretty much everything I wrote in this review, he wants to continue reading the series to know how it all ends. He's on book 2. So far, he says that the book is pretty good.

On to the next...