Wait, Wait, It Gets Better: "Hunger, A Gone Novel" Reviewed

After reading Gone, I was riveted enough to check out the sequel, the second of the six books in the series, Hunger. And as far as the writing quality goes, it's the same as the first: the pacing is swift, the characters are engaging (if still conforming to their perspective types), and of course still very much full of tropes. And even though things turn out even weirder than in the first book, it's not so outlandish this time around.

But first, a quick plot overview: three months after the events in the first book, hunger is a real issue, and it turns out man-eating worms have infested parts of the fields. Given this, plus laziness, most kids don't want to go out and pick food, even though they're on the brink of starvation. Caine comes out of a 90-day delirium that had resulted from contact with the "Darkness" (actually called a "gaiaphage," an alien creature that feeds on radioactive waste) and plans to take over the power plant. Little Pete, it turns out, is also connected to this creature. In addition to that, a group of kids without powers foster resentment against the kids with powers, intensifying conflict within Perdido Beach. Sam starts getting tired of dealing with it all, and shows the signs of an inept leader. The story leads up to Sam and Caine ultimately collaborating to destroy the gaiaphage, with the stakes raised and the incidences of violence and near-deaths much higher among the main characters--every major character experiences severe physical trauma or death in this book.

We meet some new characters who join the crew from the first book: Duck, teased by a group of normals, and who develops the ability to increase or decrease his density; Orsay, a girl who had been hiding out in the nearby state park and who has the ability to see into other people's dreams; Zil and the 'human crew,' a band of rabidly anti-mutant normals; and Hunter, a friend of Zil's who becomes an enemy when he accidentally kills another friend with his microwave hands. We also get to know several secondary characters a lot better--Dekka, Brianna, Albert, and Computer Jack--giving them more nuance and depth.

In addition to more nuanced characterization, there's also a greater diversity of characters; there's even a gay character now. Considering the large cast of characters, it's a more representative sample of the diversity in California today--though there's a surprisingly small number of Hispanics. And in this book, the true evil is not any of the wrongheaded, violent kids (except maybe Drake), it's the gaiaphage--which I'm sure will come back from the dead in good time.

As far as the plot goes, I wonder why they didn't try and take care of the hunger issue sooner--I suppose it can be chalked up to poor leadership, as Sam and co. should have prioritized tasks via immediacy and Maslow's hierarchy of needs to prevent this from happening in the first place. They also should have set up some sort of governing body by now, with different people in charge of different things, so that Sam didn't have to make all the decisions by himself. Though I guess this installment sort of resolved that issue. And absolutely nothing was said of the water: still no rain is mentioned, or even a cloud in the sky, yet water is not a problem? There is a municipal water system, but where does the water come from? I'm thinking the author took the presence of drinkable water for granted, and didn't think that would be a problem for Perdido Beach. Just like other residents of California towns that siphon their water from wetter places.

This book felt more like a long TV episode more than anything else, from the switching perspectives to the swift action scenes and snappy dialogue. However, the ending to Hunger didn't leave much in the way of cliffhangers. There is still an issue with the humans vs. mutants, we don't know if Drake is really dead (it's unsurprisingly difficult to kill off major characters), and several of the characters are shaken from the recent events, but there's no sense of imminent danger. I'm still going to read the next book, just because of the whole FAYZ mystery--which apart from the gaiaphage revelations wasn't really addressed. But it's important to note that.

In all, this book was just as enjoyable as the first--so if you liked the first one, you'll like this one. General rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars. Oppression rating? I had no major qualms with this installment, so I give it a 2. Next time, I'll be looking at Book 3, Lies.