The 100 by Kass Morgan - Book Review

Spring is here!  And I've read the first book off of my sort-of TBR for spring, so I am super proud of myself. I quit doing monthly TBRs because I sucked at keeping to them. 

So this book follows four main perspectives. Three of the four are delinquents under the age of eighteen. One is a twenty year old who will do anything to protect his sister. The book starts off right in the thick of it. We don't know what is happening other than the few sentences Clarke gives us at the very beginning setting up the story. Then there are guards in her room, and she is being taken away. Along with 99 other delinquents that are all headed to Earth, a planet that no one is sure is inhabitable or not. 

There are a lot of things that I like about this book. Sadly, there are more things that I don't like. 

One of the most important things to me when reading a book is that I like the main character. And if I'm not supposed to like a character, I have to be able to appreciate them, their story, and where they came from. It is the reason that I gave Cinder  3 stars: I didn't like Cinder. I do like the characters in this book. Not because they are extremely likeable, but because Kass Morgan writes them to be relatable (for most of the book at least).

I love all the backstory on the character. I don't like how Kass Morgan went about giving us the information. Literally half of the book is flashbacks. I felt like Kass was telling  us the characters's stories when she could have shown  us the history. 

Speaking of history, we don't get enough of it. It's not the suspicious-build type of leaving out information either. It's like her world is half built. On the Arc, there are three groups of people that are, apparently, easily distinguishable. How are they distinguishable? Skin color? Clothing? Hair? We don't know. These three groups are not really allowed to intermingle. Why? We have no idea. 

From what I gathered, it is kind of a three-tiered class system. The people from Pheonix are basically first class citizens, Arcadians are middle/second class citizens, and Waldenites are third class citizens. I think. I hate the fact that I have to question myself, but the way Kass Morgan built the society was very vague and not really well built at all. 

Also, I got a lot of overarching plot from this book, but in the book itself, there was not really a plot. It was really just 100 delinquent kids get sent to Earth. It is not even really a survival story. It's a teen drama and love story. There is too much undying love amongst our main characters for me to be comfortable with the love interests. 

I was the biggest Bellarke shipper at the beginning of this book, but now it has been diluted by all of the other love stories. I still really like Bellamy, I am still iffy on Clarke, I don't really like Wells, and I kind of wish Glass wasn't even in this story. With four character point of views and only 320 pages to do it in, there is not a lot of room for growth and development.

That is one of the major problems that I have with this book: all the alternating perspectives. Each character only has 80 pages to themselves. I wish that we could have just stuck to a third person omniscient point of view would have been really helpful with this book. With only 80 pages for each person, there is not expansion on some of the more mature themes that would have for good content.

If you like the TV show, like me, then I would recommend that you pick this up. It gives you different insight on some of the characters as well as new characters to love. 

Content: PG

Language: PG

Sex: Implied that it has happened

Violence: Nonexistent

Themes: PG-13

Yes. I will continue the series, but I do not plan on buying them for myself. My school library has both Day 21 and Homecoming, so I will pick them up in April and marathon through them one weekend. 

The 100  by Kass Morgan (The Hundred #1)
Published: 1 Jan 2013 - Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Format - Pages: Hardback - 323 pages
Genre: Young Adult Science Fiction
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Buy it: Amazon, Kindle, B&N
My Goodreads Rating

In the future, humans live in city-like spaceships orbiting far above Earth's toxic atmosphere. No one knows when, or even if, the long-abandoned planet will be habitable again. But faced with dwindling resources and a growing populace, government leaders know they must reclaim their homeland... before it's too late.

Now, one hundred juvenile delinquents are being sent on a high-stakes mission to recolonize Earth. After a brutal crash landing, the teens arrive on a savagely beautiful planet they've only seen from space. Confronting the dangers of this rugged new world, they struggle to form a tentative community. But they're haunted by their past and uncertain about the future. To survive, they must learn to trust - and even love - again.

Do any of you watch The 100 on the CW? Have you read the book? Let's fangirl about Bellarke in the comments below!

Happy Reading!