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A review by fangrunnins
Panic by Lauren Oliver
1.0
now, i'm not actually that surprised this is what i rated this book, but i am disappointed. let me be upfront on why i picked this book: i watched the show not once but twice and it is sort of a guilty pleasure of mine. while i think it's far from perfect, i enjoy plenty of it, in a 'this isn't good but i'm still having fun' kind of way.
i did not have fun with the book.
the idea of the book is solid in my opinion - and i think the book is more focused on the game than the show. the show starts losing focus during the last episodes, but here the game is always the central focus, which i enjoy because i know i'd have lost interest and dnf this without the game to pull me through. i've said where there are spoilers ahead, but if you want to be on the safe side skip this review if you don't want any spoilers.
but it's the characters that make this unbearable for me, and the writing doesn't help.
heather is one of the two protagonists we follow through-out the story. i'm glad they changed for the show her motivation behind joining panic. here she joins because her boyfriend cheats on her and then dumps her. if she had had some more thoughts beyond him, i wouldn't have minded as much. i don't think that just because it's motivated by him it'd be a bad thing, but i wish we had had more thoughts of her wanting to prove people wrong on their assumptions or something of the sort. again, i feel like this 'on the weaker' side motivation would not matter as much if the rest was solid, but heather goes from having no fear, to them saying she's always afraid, to then losing all fear again and it just... it always felt too sudden and gave me whiplash. there's also, of course, how she's described as not being pretty but then of course she is, but i'm feeling nice and let this one slide - she's a teenager growing up. maybe she grew into it, i don't know okay. even trying to find a justification feels stupid because just three months passed so like... and she's have two guys into her so i find it not so belivable.
nat. oh, nat. i actually think that in the show they give part of nat's personality to heather, as she's afraid of everything here. she's not bad for the most part (and there's some parts that make me really uncomfortable on how she's treated - this is a minor spoiler so skip it if you want but i'm pretty sure there's a much older guy interested in her, who still hasn't turned 18, in exchange for helping her become a model or actress or something of the sort. if this was a commentary on how young girls are taken advantage i wouldn't mind, but it never goes that deep. dodge shames nat for what she did and then we never speak about it again and it made me furious). other than what i talked in the parenthesis, nat does something and just... there's no consequences whatsoever and i hate that? it's not as much as a problem i have with nat as much as with the narrative and how oliver chose to tell the story because i hate when characters do stuff and then there's no consequences for it, what's the point then, but it did also ruin a bit my enjoyment of nat as a character.
dodge. i don't like this guy. he makes me furious. i hate being in his head and he makes decisions that are just... i hate them. that's really all i can say without getting into spoilers so ahead skip this paragraph if you prefer not to read them. so dodge decides to play to avenge his older sister who was paralyzed after a car accident that, oh, wasn't an accident. the issue i have with that is he knows who caused the accident: luke. and instead of going against him, he's going against ray who's mistake has been... what? being luke's sibling? i keep asking myself if i missed something and ray helped or something because it makes dodge so unlikable, like i don't get why not go against luke? it's not like his plan to kill ray was without risks, and i don't get why i should cheer him when he's going against someone who is not the guilty party. and also: learning that dayna got hurt while playing panic, while still wrong because of luke's actions, does shift a bit my perception. in the show she's flat-out a victim, whereas in the book she chose to go far enough into panic to get to joust. again, wrong from luke to do, but like go kill luke or something. other than that, we have the time when his sister makes advancements with her legs and he sulks and refuses to be happy for her? when supposedly he's about to commit murder for her? and on top of all this being in his head while he thinks of nat is unbearable. i just don't like him. all that aside, he's actually not white in this book! so that's fun to know that they erased that in the show where he's actually a likeable character. so fun to learn.
bishop i have very little to say about him because he does very little and it always revolves around heather. again, he's just very meh? and kind of pathetic? i'm very meh about him. it's not like i like him but i don't hate him either.
other than that, the ending was kind of weird with the tiger and learning that oliver didn't understand it sounds mind-blowing to me but i'm left trying to make my own interpretation then - which is fine, i miss english class anyways, but like. still. other than that, ray's character here is extremely small, and i didn't realize how much his character added to the story told in the series until i saw how he wasn't as much here. the challenges were a bit fun to read, even if i call everything else in this book boring, but again: they feel more fun to watch in a tv show because it's not that there were huge descriptions here either or so creative that they hold up by themselves. at least with the visual it's fun. and what we gain in the book is to read the character's internal thoughts and i've said how i feel about it.
0verall, it's not a good book. i didn't get into the writing, but i didn't enjoy it either, and the characters harm the story so much that i could barely enjoy the challenges.
i did not have fun with the book.
the idea of the book is solid in my opinion - and i think the book is more focused on the game than the show. the show starts losing focus during the last episodes, but here the game is always the central focus, which i enjoy because i know i'd have lost interest and dnf this without the game to pull me through. i've said where there are spoilers ahead, but if you want to be on the safe side skip this review if you don't want any spoilers.
but it's the characters that make this unbearable for me, and the writing doesn't help.
heather is one of the two protagonists we follow through-out the story. i'm glad they changed for the show her motivation behind joining panic. here she joins because her boyfriend cheats on her and then dumps her. if she had had some more thoughts beyond him, i wouldn't have minded as much. i don't think that just because it's motivated by him it'd be a bad thing, but i wish we had had more thoughts of her wanting to prove people wrong on their assumptions or something of the sort. again, i feel like this 'on the weaker' side motivation would not matter as much if the rest was solid, but heather goes from having no fear, to them saying she's always afraid, to then losing all fear again and it just... it always felt too sudden and gave me whiplash. there's also, of course, how she's described as not being pretty but then of course she is, but i'm feeling nice and let this one slide - she's a teenager growing up. maybe she grew into it, i don't know okay. even trying to find a justification feels stupid because just three months passed so like... and she's have two guys into her so i find it not so belivable.
nat. oh, nat. i actually think that in the show they give part of nat's personality to heather, as she's afraid of everything here. she's not bad for the most part (and there's some parts that make me really uncomfortable on how she's treated - this is a minor spoiler so skip it if you want but i'm pretty sure there's a much older guy interested in her, who still hasn't turned 18, in exchange for helping her become a model or actress or something of the sort. if this was a commentary on how young girls are taken advantage i wouldn't mind, but it never goes that deep. dodge shames nat for what she did and then we never speak about it again and it made me furious). other than what i talked in the parenthesis, nat does something and just... there's no consequences whatsoever and i hate that? it's not as much as a problem i have with nat as much as with the narrative and how oliver chose to tell the story because i hate when characters do stuff and then there's no consequences for it, what's the point then, but it did also ruin a bit my enjoyment of nat as a character.
dodge. i don't like this guy. he makes me furious. i hate being in his head and he makes decisions that are just... i hate them. that's really all i can say without getting into spoilers so ahead skip this paragraph if you prefer not to read them. so dodge decides to play to avenge his older sister who was paralyzed after a car accident that, oh, wasn't an accident. the issue i have with that is he knows who caused the accident: luke. and instead of going against him, he's going against ray who's mistake has been... what? being luke's sibling? i keep asking myself if i missed something and ray helped or something because it makes dodge so unlikable, like i don't get why not go against luke? it's not like his plan to kill ray was without risks, and i don't get why i should cheer him when he's going against someone who is not the guilty party. and also: learning that dayna got hurt while playing panic, while still wrong because of luke's actions, does shift a bit my perception. in the show she's flat-out a victim, whereas in the book she chose to go far enough into panic to get to joust. again, wrong from luke to do, but like go kill luke or something. other than that, we have the time when his sister makes advancements with her legs and he sulks and refuses to be happy for her? when supposedly he's about to commit murder for her? and on top of all this being in his head while he thinks of nat is unbearable. i just don't like him. all that aside, he's actually not white in this book! so that's fun to know that they erased that in the show where he's actually a likeable character. so fun to learn.
bishop i have very little to say about him because he does very little and it always revolves around heather. again, he's just very meh? and kind of pathetic? i'm very meh about him. it's not like i like him but i don't hate him either.
other than that, the ending was kind of weird with the tiger and learning that oliver didn't understand it sounds mind-blowing to me but i'm left trying to make my own interpretation then - which is fine, i miss english class anyways, but like. still. other than that, ray's character here is extremely small, and i didn't realize how much his character added to the story told in the series until i saw how he wasn't as much here. the challenges were a bit fun to read, even if i call everything else in this book boring, but again: they feel more fun to watch in a tv show because it's not that there were huge descriptions here either or so creative that they hold up by themselves. at least with the visual it's fun. and what we gain in the book is to read the character's internal thoughts and i've said how i feel about it.
0verall, it's not a good book. i didn't get into the writing, but i didn't enjoy it either, and the characters harm the story so much that i could barely enjoy the challenges.