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A review by srirachareadsalot
Panic by Lauren Oliver
2.0
Panic follows the story of a small town named Carp, in Upstate New York. Every summer, the town holds a high-stake competition with the graduating seniors called Panic, where the winner wins a jackpot of around 50,000 dollars. Meet our two main characters; Heather-- a girl who never planned to join but after being broken up with by her boyfriend she joins on a spur of the moment decision, and Dodge-- a boy fueled by revenge for what the game did to his older sister, Dayna. Who will ultimately win? And who will pay the price?
So many people told me this book was going to be bad. Like an overwhelming amount of people. But one day, I decided to buy the damn book and I refuse to un-haul books I have bought myself, and so alas on this fateful day I decided to give this book the benefit of the doubt because why not? Yeah, now I know EXACTLY why not.
The ONE resounding positive I can give this book is the atmosphere.I have a special place in my heart for claustrophobic small towns where everyone knows each other a little too well. The desperation and claustrophobia of the characters felt like it was oozing off the book's pages. The sweltering heat and tension in the air was some epic pathetic fallacy may I add. Yeah, the only thing I liked about this book was that it was hot outside. Oh, maybe also that they didn't ship Dodge and Heather together, and so at least I didn't feel a need to hit my head against a wall. Yay me!
The first main issue I had was connecting with the characters and their motivations; Heather decides to join in like TWO seconds. She has just broken up with her boyfriend and she's like 'fuck this I'm joining!' and I don't really know how they correlate? Impulsiveness is an interesting concept, and we never truly get to understand further why she decided to do it. The boyfriend comes back in like two scenes, and so we never truly get an idea of how Heather feels about why she joined the competition and how she feels about her spur of the moment decision. Her motivations throughout the novel are so extremely murky. Dodge's motivations are a little clearer, but not as much as I would've wanted them to be. His main idea is to seek revenge for the life-altering injuries caused to his sister in a former Panic competition. I just wish his relationship with his sister had been a little more evident and strong at times, so his motivations seemed a little more rational. The scenes the two characters had together seemed lacking and their relationship wasn't as developed as I may have liked it to be.
The other huge issue I had with this book was the game of Panic itself. I was expecting this book to be fuelled by near-death experiences, and crazy suspense and twists but that wasn't the story we received at all. It was fuelled more by teenage drama and antics than I would've liked. Maybe had the relationships with the characters had been stronger this would've been easier to comprehend, but Nat and Dodge's "relationship" was more prevalent in this story than the game itself. The book was not nearly focused enough on the game itself as I would've wanted it to be. It ended up being focused on underdeveloped subplots such as Heather and her sister's relationship with their mother, and the relationships the friend group itself had-- not to mention Dodge never talked to these people the day before he met them and suddenly they are all chummy chummy? Like what? If the characters themselves weren't so FREAKING flat maybe this would've been a decent character-driven story built on the relationships the characters had, and how that influenced their Panic decisions which wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it would've been decent nonetheless) all would be right in the world but that's not what we got, was it?
Bottom line: I should've listened to all the negative reviews...
So many people told me this book was going to be bad. Like an overwhelming amount of people. But one day, I decided to buy the damn book and I refuse to un-haul books I have bought myself, and so alas on this fateful day I decided to give this book the benefit of the doubt because why not? Yeah, now I know EXACTLY why not.
The ONE resounding positive I can give this book is the atmosphere.I have a special place in my heart for claustrophobic small towns where everyone knows each other a little too well. The desperation and claustrophobia of the characters felt like it was oozing off the book's pages. The sweltering heat and tension in the air was some epic pathetic fallacy may I add. Yeah, the only thing I liked about this book was that it was hot outside. Oh, maybe also that they didn't ship Dodge and Heather together, and so at least I didn't feel a need to hit my head against a wall. Yay me!
The first main issue I had was connecting with the characters and their motivations; Heather decides to join in like TWO seconds. She has just broken up with her boyfriend and she's like 'fuck this I'm joining!' and I don't really know how they correlate? Impulsiveness is an interesting concept, and we never truly get to understand further why she decided to do it. The boyfriend comes back in like two scenes, and so we never truly get an idea of how Heather feels about why she joined the competition and how she feels about her spur of the moment decision. Her motivations throughout the novel are so extremely murky. Dodge's motivations are a little clearer, but not as much as I would've wanted them to be. His main idea is to seek revenge for the life-altering injuries caused to his sister in a former Panic competition. I just wish his relationship with his sister had been a little more evident and strong at times, so his motivations seemed a little more rational. The scenes the two characters had together seemed lacking and their relationship wasn't as developed as I may have liked it to be.
The other huge issue I had with this book was the game of Panic itself. I was expecting this book to be fuelled by near-death experiences, and crazy suspense and twists but that wasn't the story we received at all. It was fuelled more by teenage drama and antics than I would've liked. Maybe had the relationships with the characters had been stronger this would've been easier to comprehend, but Nat and Dodge's "relationship" was more prevalent in this story than the game itself. The book was not nearly focused enough on the game itself as I would've wanted it to be. It ended up being focused on underdeveloped subplots such as Heather and her sister's relationship with their mother, and the relationships the friend group itself had-- not to mention Dodge never talked to these people the day before he met them and suddenly they are all chummy chummy? Like what? If the characters themselves weren't so FREAKING flat maybe this would've been a decent character-driven story built on the relationships the characters had, and how that influenced their Panic decisions which wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it would've been decent nonetheless) all would be right in the world but that's not what we got, was it?
Bottom line: I should've listened to all the negative reviews...