Description:
In this exhilarating companion to Printz Award winner and National Book Award finalist Ship Breaker, Paolo Bacigalupi brilliantly captures a dark future America that has devolved into unending civil wars, driven by demagogues who recruit children to become soulless killing machines. Two refugees of these wars, Mahlia and Mouse, are known as 'war maggots': survivors who have barely managed to escape the unspeakable violence plaguing the war-torn lands of the Drowned Cities. But their fragile safety is threatened when they discover a wounded half-man--a bioengineered war beast named Tool, who is hunted by a vengeful band of soldiers. When tragedy strikes, Mahlia is faced with an impossible decision: risk everything to save the boy who once saved her, or flee to her own safety. Drawing upon the brutal truths of current events, The Drowned Cities is a powerful story of loyalty, survival, and heart-pounding adventure.
Releasing May 3rd, 2012
Chaos' Review:
So lets begin with this cover. Its gorgeous and well balanced with the right hint of colors that catches the readers attention. As always, many of us have the tendency to judge books by their covers, even if the habit is bad, we all know that the perfect way to snatch publicity for a book is to combine the story with beautiful illustrations on the cover. Its the ultimate plan.
The Drowned Cities is the companion of the well known Ship Breaker book, and has a very erupt beginning. I'd say that the beginning was what kept me reading further because it was so WEIRD but in a GOOD way! It contained a completely different story that isn't the typical "Girl meets boy, they hate each, then sparks fly after critical incident, LOVE". Yeaaaa....That story line is always fun, but predictable. This book on the other hand, was not predictable in any sense at all. There's a raging beast, a big mouth girl and a guy named Mouse.
The big mouth girl...aka Mahlia was probably my one of favorite characters. She was upfront, had a bad temper, and even if she couldn't or more like -wasn't- allowed to speak her mind due to certain circumstances because she's a castoff product to a Chinese father and Caucasian mother; her mother passed away, whilst her father abandoned her. Therefore she lives under the guidance of a Doctor in a small village, where nobody really likes her because she's seen as "Bad Luck". Moreover, she literally didn't like being spoken down to, and would probably punch someone down if the wrong words spilled out of their mouths (once she gets the chance XP). LOL. Yeaup, she was one of my favorites.
This book was filled with a lot of bloodshed and doesn't really hold a lot hope as the story continues. So if your one of those romance genre addicts, this obviously does not seem like the book for you. Also, the characters are mainly kids, and Paolo Bacigalupi twisted the story where teens are either being killed or are created to kill. It was evidently really gruesome in a wordy sense, but it kept me reading and I didn't regret opening it up once it arrived in my mailbox.
4 Stars
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