Author: Suzanne Collins
Rating: 
Reading Level: 4th and up
Pages: 343Publisher: Scholastic Press
Edition: Hardcover, 2006
This 4th installment in the Underland series is more powerful than the previous. The plot is tight. The characters are more developed and complex and the dangers are even more real now. I don't know how young readers without much knowledge of the holocaust might react to the scene where the Nibblers (the mice) are lured unsuspectingly to be mass-murdered. I was shocked at the brutality of this scene, although I think Collins did a superb job.
I believe this is supposed to be the second to last book and am eagerly awaiting the concluding volume!
This is a book that every single person should read. Satrapi has the gift of injecting much humor into a story that is ultimately tremendously disturbing and sad. The images (being a Graphic non-fiction) are fittingly simplistic and yet so expressive: the war dead, the tortured, the rebellious teens, the loving parents, the everyday people. I cried at least 3 times in different places. If I hadn't been reading it in the crowded school cafeteria, I probably would have cried more than that -- but I also laughed out loud a few times at the wit and comical situations Marji experienced. What an amazing accomplishment.
This reads so differently from Blade Runner which it inspired. I am more or less indifferent to the book -- I like the philosophical aspect of it but also am a bit bored reading too much musing and not enough action. Might be a bit unfair since my expectation was based on the action-packed movie..
This is truly a delightful illustrated light fantasy. (Graphic Novel?) Being a compilation of short stories that do not seem to have an overall structure of a longer "novel," parts of it seem incomplete and others seem a bit too lengthy. It is a prime example, however, of how a graphic novel really works: the story of the bearded ladies really drives the notion that the graphics enhance the narrative. Each time the reader sees a panel with these bearded beauties (? haha,) the "shocking" impact is refreshed. In a plain text narrative, one can easily forget that Beatrice is a burly manly bearded woman but you simply cannot escape these images and ignore this fact here!
