"It is unfair. People versus mosquito. Who should win? We built rockets and cathedrals. We wrote poems and symphonies. We found a passage though time. And yet. We also wreck the planet for our own habitation and the mosquito will win. Unless we succeed in changing course, it will win."
Prenna James is from the future. In 2090, the Earth is failing to support human life; global warming has destroyed the food supply and a blood plague transmitted by mosquitoes has been killing people rampantly. A small group of survivors has figured out how to jump through time and have escaped to the past in the year 2010. When Prenna arrives in 2010, she appears in a haze, naked, and with a weird number on her arm, in the middle of a small fishing pond right in front of Ethan Jarves, leaving him even more stunned. As a time immigrant, Prenna and the rest of the survivors have strict rules to follow set forth by their leaders in a very cult-like fashion. The most important rule, and the one Prenna wants to break- Never fall in love with a time-native.
I liked the premise for this story; people returning to the past because future Earth is inhospitable due to human actions and global warming. This is a great topic to discuss since we can actually do something about it now, which Prenna discusses in the book when she is in 2014. I liked Prenna's character, a strong-willed female within her community who senses something is wrong and tries to change it. I think many young readers will relate to Prenna. That being said, Ethan's character falls a little flat, other than being a super-smart guy in Prenna's class who happened to be there when she arrived, he is just sort of played off as a love interest. There were also a lot of points in this book in the plot-hole and suspension of disbelief categories that as an adult reader made me think 'huh?' Example, in the middle of trying to prevent a murder and save the future Earth, let's produce a mysterious fake ID and have sangria on the beach! Middle grade YA readers probably wouldn't worry about that stuff as much though and would probably find the book a bit more enjoyable.
This book was provided for free in return for an honest review.
Prenna James is from the future. In 2090, the Earth is failing to support human life; global warming has destroyed the food supply and a blood plague transmitted by mosquitoes has been killing people rampantly. A small group of survivors has figured out how to jump through time and have escaped to the past in the year 2010. When Prenna arrives in 2010, she appears in a haze, naked, and with a weird number on her arm, in the middle of a small fishing pond right in front of Ethan Jarves, leaving him even more stunned. As a time immigrant, Prenna and the rest of the survivors have strict rules to follow set forth by their leaders in a very cult-like fashion. The most important rule, and the one Prenna wants to break- Never fall in love with a time-native.
I liked the premise for this story; people returning to the past because future Earth is inhospitable due to human actions and global warming. This is a great topic to discuss since we can actually do something about it now, which Prenna discusses in the book when she is in 2014. I liked Prenna's character, a strong-willed female within her community who senses something is wrong and tries to change it. I think many young readers will relate to Prenna. That being said, Ethan's character falls a little flat, other than being a super-smart guy in Prenna's class who happened to be there when she arrived, he is just sort of played off as a love interest. There were also a lot of points in this book in the plot-hole and suspension of disbelief categories that as an adult reader made me think 'huh?' Example, in the middle of trying to prevent a murder and save the future Earth, let's produce a mysterious fake ID and have sangria on the beach! Middle grade YA readers probably wouldn't worry about that stuff as much though and would probably find the book a bit more enjoyable.
This book was provided for free in return for an honest review.
