196. The Boy on the Bridge
Rating: ☆☆1/2
Recommended by:
Author: M.R. Carey
Genre: Fiction, Science Fiction, Dystopia, Young Adult
392 pages, published May 2, 2017
Reading Format: Audio Book on Overdrive
Summary
The Boy on the Bridge is the second book in the Hungry Plague series (a prequel to the first which was The Girl With All the Gifts) and takes place in a world ravaged by the highly contagious Cordyceps fungus that turns its victims into zombies (called “hungries” in the book) and is spread by biting. The main character is fifteen year old Stephen Greaves, a scientific genius who invents a chemical blocker to hide human pheromones from the hungries’ senses. Like Melanie in The Girl With All the Gifts, Stephen is surrounded by adults who mostly treat him with contempt, caution, or outright loathing. Stephen is unnerved by physical contact, untrue statements, and uncertainty, and approaches challenges with a mechanical, scientific interest. He and Samrina Khan, the only person Stephen has bonded with, are part of a ten member crew on board the heavily armed mobile laboratory Rosalind Franklin. They are on a desperate mission to develop a cure for infected humans.
Quotes
“He had already learned to read, but now he learned the pleasure of stories which is like no other pleasure—the experience of slipping sideways into another world and living there for as long as you want to.”
“If everyone always knows what they’re doing and acts in a perfectly rational way, how did most of world history happen?”
“To go mad, to lose your mind, which is the only thing that’s really yours because it’s really you … That would be an inexpressibly terrible thing. And at the same time it would be nothing, because you yourself would be unable, from within that damaged state, to recognise or reflect on it.”
“She is an anomaly. Anomalies explode old theories and engender new ones. They are dangerous and glorious.”
“It rains on the just and the unjust. Nothing you can do but turn your collar up.”
“You shouldn’t kill a man without being aware of the possibilities, the futures, you’re snuffing out. The younger the target, the more of those possible futures there are. Killing a child is like killing a vast multitude.”
“The world is information. An endless torrent. Whatever escapes you becomes something you will never completely understand.”
“Things don’t end, after all. They only change, and you keep changing with them.”
“Loyalty is just the wheels on the bus … meaning that it keeps things moving but it’s neutral when it comes to the direction they move in.”
My Take
After really enjoying The Girl With All the Gifts, I was looking forward to reading its prequel, The Boy on the Bridge. Unfortunately, M.R. Carey’s second entry in the Hungry Plague series falls well short of his first effort. What’s missing from The Boy on the Bridge is the element of surprise from the first book where it is slowly revealed how the dystopian world operates. The Girl With All the Gifts also featured a much more compelling relationship between the two main characters. Interesting at times, but not enough to recommend it.
