Beside a dried up lake in a futuristic, dusty world live a family of four. A bitter father, withdrawn since the loss of his wife, two grown twins, Saba and Lugh, and the lively nine year old Emmi scrape out an existence. With their father still immersed in grief, losing his head in the distant stars, Saba and Lugh are forced to battle the desert conditions to keep the family alive.
In their eighteen year, the restless Lugh begins to dream of leaving the dead-end farm. When their father is shot dead trying to stop a mysterious gang from capturing Lugh, Saba vows to track them and rescue her twin brother at all costs. Accustomed to following Lugh like a shadow and distrustful of others, Saba is determined to find him alone. Despite her lack of social graces, Saba's knack for picking up friends means that she unwittingly becomes the leader of a rebellion.
For a petulant king rules this world with a vice-like grip. Previously unchallenged, he crushes resistance with a steady supply of a sedative-like drug and the blood-thirsty spectacle of cage fighting. Fixated with the need to find her brother, Saba couldn't care less about the King. That is, until he gets in the way of her search. And though he might not know it yet, Saba is not the type of woman he should get in the way of.
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I'm sure it's not just being in the U.S this week that's making me draw comparisons between this YA action-packed novel and the Western genre. The dry, arid setting, horses, the theme of leaving a homestead, duels with 'shooters' and puffed-up gang-like leaders with hired lackeys. It's a quality which differentiates the book from the ever-present 'Hunger Games', which it's often compared to. Like many apocalyptic stories, the futuristic setting resembles more closely an older world to that we live in. The lack of modern convenience and communication in Saba's world has made her grow self-sufficient and tough-both qualities popular to young adult fiction. The author's also created a landscape which lends itself really well to an old-fashioned adventure, with hugh rocks, sandstorms, mountains and flash floods.
Saba is an opinionated protagonist with a big personality and a strong will. The characters and events she's thrown amongst during the course of this tale force her to question her opinions and actions, but the author doesn't spend a great chuck of prose on these revelations. Instead the change in Saba is shown by the way she responds to the various challenges she's faced with. Without the stalwart support of her twin brother, she ends up initiating new friendships, slowly opening herself up to the idea of relying on others. So there's a fair bit of character development going on here and Lugh's absence in the story is central to this. Whilst I can see the motivation for this, I couldn't help thinking that story could have been richer and fuller if it had also been told from Lugh's point of view.
My only other bug-bear was the style of writing. The lack of punctuation left me confused as to who was speaking and I was baffled by Saba's intermittent italicsised monologues. The kooky spelling and childish grammar means that Saba's voice is distinct and strong, but it felt a little twee at times.
That being said, the prominence of this style faded as I got pulled deeper into the story, and the self-conscious poetic element of the first few chapters was replaced by drawn-out action and suspense-filled chapter endings. I was also captivated by the sexual underpinings of Saba's interactions with a wandering rebel named Jack and the dark, brooding guard to the king, DeMalo. Moira Young recreates perfectly the insecurity, excitement and fear involved in an adolescent crush. It's fairly clear from the book's end that Young has written this with a sequel (if not a trilogy) in mind. Whilst this means that the ending can't truly be described as satisfying, I can comfort myself with the fact that Saba's likely to turn up again soon.
