Scan barcode
A review by bookninja232b4
Pills and Starships by Lydia Millet
This author is acclaimed for her adult novels, so I was hopeful that this was going to be really strong and smart. In the end, the world she created didn't make as much sense as I'd hoped. I bought into the possibility that many of those things could happen, but in a world where so many people's lives are controlled by pharmaceuticals (pharms) it would seem a lot easier method for population control--and something that clearly could have been done in earlier generations to keep people, even in the poorest parts of this world, from reproducing. So that kind of fell apart for me.
The choice to tell the story in a diary format held me at arm's length, leaving me uninvested. I wanted to care about Nat, but her emotions were kind of flat-lined so I never got a sense of her. The secondary characters lacked development, despite the fact that they orchestrated the entire plot.
Interestingly enough, an NPR interviewer recently suggested this book is darker than other YA dystopians because it isn't obviously violent, but I'd disagree. The corporation never seemed especially sinister, the stakes were never terribly high (even during a Category Six storm), and the main character was rarely an active participant in her own salvation. Millet's dystopian world isn't any more profound or terrifying than Suzanne Collins or Paolo Bacigalupi. I'm not saying that was her intent, but she certainly breaks no new ground here.
The choice to tell the story in a diary format held me at arm's length, leaving me uninvested. I wanted to care about Nat, but her emotions were kind of flat-lined so I never got a sense of her. The secondary characters lacked development, despite the fact that they orchestrated the entire plot.
Interestingly enough, an NPR interviewer recently suggested this book is darker than other YA dystopians because it isn't obviously violent, but I'd disagree. The corporation never seemed especially sinister, the stakes were never terribly high (even during a Category Six storm), and the main character was rarely an active participant in her own salvation. Millet's dystopian world isn't any more profound or terrifying than Suzanne Collins or Paolo Bacigalupi. I'm not saying that was her intent, but she certainly breaks no new ground here.