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A review by onceandfuturereads
The Lord of Opium by Nancy Farmer
adventurous
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I listened to this right after a re-read of House of the Scorpion, and the audiobook is terrific. At first, I thought how perfect it was that Matt, the clone of an evil drug lord, was now fourteen and quite sassy. Some parts were laugh-out-loud FUNNY. But it quickly became evident that Matt had bigger problems than your average bear (teenager).
The themes of this book square up against even the most colossal "adult books." A non-exhaustive list: slavery, drug addiction, children's autonomy, environmental crisis, medical ethics, religion versus science, nature versus nurture. These are things that I hope young adults read while they're young and ponder into and for the rest of their adulthood. I read House of the Scorpion in elementary school and I remember it having a profound effect on me.
Reading the sequel as an adult has strengthened two of my opinions: one, that adults do not read enough YA, or at least they brush it off too quickly. And two, that the type of YA that gets sold and marketed today is a far cry from what it used to be. Even the contemporary YA books that do tackle heavy themes are tropey, or are too lacking in sub-text. As a society, we need to have confidence that kids will understand without us holding their hands. In The Lord of Opium, for example, there are no easy answers. Good people are made of evil ones and even the good ones do evil things.
Like Andrew Smith said, Keep YA weird!
The themes of this book square up against even the most colossal "adult books." A non-exhaustive list: slavery, drug addiction, children's autonomy, environmental crisis, medical ethics, religion versus science, nature versus nurture. These are things that I hope young adults read while they're young and ponder into and for the rest of their adulthood. I read House of the Scorpion in elementary school and I remember it having a profound effect on me.
Reading the sequel as an adult has strengthened two of my opinions: one, that adults do not read enough YA, or at least they brush it off too quickly. And two, that the type of YA that gets sold and marketed today is a far cry from what it used to be. Even the contemporary YA books that do tackle heavy themes are tropey, or are too lacking in sub-text. As a society, we need to have confidence that kids will understand without us holding their hands. In The Lord of Opium, for example, there are no easy answers. Good people are made of evil ones and even the good ones do evil things.
Like Andrew Smith said, Keep YA weird!