I received this book for free from Reviewer Purchase in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Panic by Lauren Oliver Published by HarperCollins on 3/4/14
Genres: Contemporary, Thrillers, Young Adult
Pages: 416
Format: Paperback
Source: Reviewer Purchase
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Panic began as so many things do in Carp, a poor town of twelve thousand people in the middle of nowhere: because it was summer, and there was nothing else to do. Heather never thought she would compete in panic, a legendary game played by graduating seniors. She'd never thought of herself as fearless, the kind of person who would fight to stand out. But when she finds something, and someone, to fight for, she will discover that she is braver than she ever thought.
Dodge has never been afraid of panic. His secret will fuel him, and get him all the way through the game; he's sure of it. But what he doesn't know is that he's not the only one with a secret. Everyone has something to play for. For Heather and Dodge, the game will bring new alliances, unexpected revelations, and the possibility of first love for each of them—and the knowledge that sometimes the very things we fear are those we need the most.
Short and Sweet Review
Panic is a game played in Carp by graduating seniors. Panic is a high stakes game where the players are putting their lives on the line and the last person standing gets a reward. Our main characters Heather and Dodge both have different reasons for joining. Heather was basically an impulse decision and Dodge wants to play for revenge. In the book we see alliances formed and broken.
Panic is basically challenges that are supposed to be dangerous and risky and we see a large group of seniors dwindle down until we get to the final two. I honestly was kind of bored, I thought the challenges would be more exciting but I personally didn’t think so and some of the things that happened were just not necessarily unbelievable but just the probability of these things happening are low. The law enforcement in Carp is also a joke, Panic has been going on for years supposedly but the cops have never stopped it even though they’ve been “trying to.”
We see Heather’s home life which isn’t great and although it wasn’t her motivation to win it becomes her motivation to win especially after a string events happens that leaves Heather and her younger sister homeless. Dodge on the other hand is trying to get revenge for his sister who competed in Panic and had an accident. Natalie and Bishop are also characters and their Heathers best friends but Natalie makes an alliance with Dodge and she’s basically using him because she knows she’s not going to be able to make it to the end. Natalie is Dodge’s love interest and I didn’t like the “connection” between the two, she was using him and he was infatuated with her so he was like a little puppy dog. Heather on the other hand had Bishop as a love interest and he was always looking out for her but I feel like she didn’t know exactly how she felt about him. Anyway the ending was okay it wasn’t special and didn’t seem realistic. This was an okay book I thought it would have been better if I could connect to the characters and then maybe I would have felt something when they were doing these dangerous challenges.
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