On My Bookshelf // 01

Happy Friday! Who’s excited for the weekend? I know that I am… mostly because I have lots of reading and writing planned. And cuddles with Little One, of course.

Speaking of reading, I have a book review for you today. In my last reading roundup I mentioned that I want to share book reviews more often so that I can go into more detail about them, so here is the first in my new book review series “On My Bookshelf.”

THE BOOK

Lockdown: Escape from Furnace by Alexander Gordon Smith is about Alex, a fourteen-year-old who is imprisoned for a murder that he didn’t commit. He has to serve out his sentence in Furnace, a new prison for juveniles buried a mile below the earth’s surface, and when Alex is taken to Furnace, he resigns himself to the fact that he will not come out. But when Alex realizes that there are others who were framed, he starts to form an escape plan.

This is the second book that my coworker and I read for our book club (and my first pick!). We’re going to discuss the book at lunch today and I’m looking forward to hearing what he thought of the book. As soon as I read the synopsis I was totally sold on a story that takes place in a prison that’s located under the surface of the earth. I was hoping that the setting would play a bigger role in the story. Yes, it made the chance of escaping seem nearly impossible, but I was imagining a Journey to the Center of the Earth prison setting and was a little disappointed that I didn’t get it. But it was still a really cool setting that added tension to the story and I’m not sure that my vision for the setting would have been believable.

I had trouble connecting with the characters. I felt like I really
didn’t know any of them enough to feel an attachment to them. That being
said, I wanted all of them to be okay and I cheered for them as they
planned for their escape.

I had a little bit of trouble with the world building in the story. I wasn’t convinced (based on the explanation of why they built Furnace) that things were bad enough in society that the public would be willing to build this prison underground that prisoners don’t come out of and then put juveniles in it. I would have liked more of an explanation about why things were so bad and why people were okay with teens being sent to Furnace. However, I don’t know how a bigger explanation would have fit into the pacing of the story, because this book moved quickly!

The fast pace of the novel definitely had me turning pages. I was always eager to find out what would happen next and I thought of this book when I wasn’t reading it. It was a quick and fun read that I really enjoyed, even with the few issues that I listed above. As soon as I finished this one, I was ready to read book two! I’ll definitely pick that up soon.

CURRENTLY READING

I took a quick break from Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell to read Lockdown in time for our book club meeting today, so I’m excited to pick that up again and finish it. I’m also listening to Crossed, which is book two in the Matched trilogy by Ally Condie.

PS – Check out the book discussion for The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro!

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