What a cool concept!
Seriously, Michael Grant always has the best ideas for books. EVER! The Gone series was A-Mazing and Messenger of Fear was really cool!
Where do I start?
Okay, okay, I got it. Messenger of Fear is the story of Mara, a teenage girl who wakes up surrounded by yellow mist. Then, she learns that she is going to become a messenger of fear and her teacher is Messenger (with a capital M yes). This Messenger guy is kind of creepy and he doesn't want to tell Mara anything. She's pist off but the lessons she learns make her understand more and more what's going on and at the end... Well that I can't tell you because it would ruin the book but at the end, she understands everything.
This book went by so fast! One minute Mara was waking up and the next, she was... doing other stuff that i wont mention because I don't want to ruin the ending, but you get what I mean!I really enjoyed Mara's voice. She had real, human, teenage reactions, and the way she explained everything was great. I did not have trouble situating myself in the story, which can be a problem for me sometimes because I get lost in the descriptions. But Mara, she described what she saw and felt in a way that made me see and feel things too! Gret job Michael Grant!
I also loved the fact that there wasn't many characters. Compared to Gone, which had about a gazillion kids and teenagers in it, it was great to concentrate on Mara and Messenger.
And the plot... I feel like nothing happened, but at the same time everything happened! Does it make sense? The book went by so fast that I got to the end without remembering a single thing of what I had just read. All I could remember was that it was good.
Finally, I need to talk about the ending. I figured it out, but then dismissed my idea since it didn't click with some details mentioned earlier, and I was so shocked when I found out I had been right all along! I do not know how I would be able to live if I was in Mara's shoes. Those who have read the book will undersand what I meen.
The major theme in this book is the oppisition of right and wrong, in other words, maintaining balance. But for me, it is also bullying and suicide. Those are touchy subject, and the way Michael Grant incorporated them in his story, the way he handled it, it got to me. The worst part is, you want to feel sorry for some characters even though they did horrible things, and that's where it becomes tricky. Can circumstances change a wrong for a right? It's all subjective really, but it gets you thinking, which is, I think, the point of this book.
I'll end this here. I'm all over the place (again, what's new?) but it's because it's harder for me to explain why I loved a book so much than why I hated it.
Take care guys!
Sophie
