jrosenstein 's review for:

The Drowned Cities by Paolo Bacigalupi

4.0

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This follow up to Shipbreaker is not really a sequel. It takes place in the same world but does not feature most of the same characters. I found Shipbreaker to be an incredibly intense and harrowing dystopian novel, and this one is even more violent and bleak. The two children at the heart of this novel, Mouse and Mahlia, are "war maggots," orphaned by the endless conflicts between petty warlords who recruit child soldiers and destroy anyone in their path. The world of the book, one of endless war, is eerily similar to real-life conflicts in Africa, with the use of child soldiers and mutilation as a weapon of war. By transplanting these brutal practices to the U.S. Bacigalupi brings up big questions about human nature and what it means to be civilized. Are any nations really more civilized than others or are we all just animals? There is not as much ultimate hope here as there was in Shipbreaker but Bacigalupi does give us moments to catch our breaths among all the death and destruction. There's a lot (a lot) of violence here, but it should catch some reluctant readers.