The Scourge by Jennifer Nielsen

I picked up The Scourge at the same school book fair that I found Frost in. I was initially drawn in by the cool cover design, and summary on the back. When I noticed it was by Jennifer Nielsen, that sealed the deal. I read one of her other young adult novels, The False Prince, a few years ago and enjoyed it. It's one of the few books that boys in my classes tend to like, and I recommend it a lot to students with an interest in fantasy.  Hoping for more of the same, I decided to give The Scourge a try this month.

The novel is set in a fictional medieval world and follows a teenage girl named Ani Mells. She lives in a poor village within her kingdom, but she doesn't let it get her down. Characterized as a brash troublemaker from the start, she spends her days scrounging around for food and coins and getting into all sorts of scrapes with her best friend, Weevil. At the novel's start, she finds herself in the worst trouble she's ever gotten into when she is snatched from her town by the governor's wardens during a random search and tested for the Scourge, a plague-like disease that is ravaging her kingdom. To make matters worse, Weevil, who immediately tries to liberate Ani from the wardens, ends up being taken for testing as well.

To Ani's great surprise, she tests positive for the disease despite having no symptoms. She is then sent to Attic Island, an old prison-turned hospital, to spend her remaining days until the Scourge finally takes her. All people who test positive for the Scourge are sent to this island, to prevent them from spreading the disease others. Weevil, who managed to slip away from the wardens before his test could be administered, talks his way onto the boat headed for the island as well, because he refuses to abandon his friend.

Once Ani and Weevil arrive on the island, it becomes apparent that something suspicious is going on. Rather than the peaceful and compassionate living situation that was promised, the Scourge victims on the island are treated like slaves and subjected to endless drudgery at menial tasks. They are punished if they don't complete their daily jobs with beatings and confinement.  The behavior of the wardens and the other Scourge victims leave Ani certain that there is more going on on the island than meets the eye, and together with Weevil, she sets out to uncover the truth.

Unfortunately, I was a bit disappointed with this novel. The plot felt thin, and a lot of the events within it were unrealistic. I fully understand that reading young adult fantasy means that you have to suspend your disbelief and just enjoy the ride, but so much of what happened was so overly convenient that I couldn't help but roll my eyes. Many situations and pieces of dialogue were contrived. The characters didn't behave in ways consistent with functioning human beings.

For example, in one scene, Ani and Weevil get in trouble with the wardens on the island for something. They are taken to a private area and a warden pulls out a rod, presumably to deliver a beating. Rather than just beat them and move on, the warden makes them argue back and forth about who is the worse friend until they end up actually getting mad at each other. The warden then lets them go without a beating, because the real punishment was to ruin their friendship. Umm...what? To make matters worse, Ani and Weevil had been on the island a total of five minutes before this scene. It would have been impossible for a warden to pick up on their friendship and make them fight with each other in such a short time. There are a lot of moments like this, where things are obviously twisted past the point of sense to serve the plot. It was distracting.

Another aspect of the story that felt off was the way the characters spoke. The story was set in a faux-medieval time period, but all of the characters speak in a completely modern way. Ani, for example, calls one of the characters, "literally the worst person I've ever met." She also muses at one point that Weevil, "might have gone fully insane." She didn't sound like a girl living in a past era, she sounded like one of my students today. The language use was a distraction that took me out of the story from time to time.

That being said, The Scourge wasn't all bad. The mystery of the island was an interesting enough plot line to keep me reading, and Ani's outgoing spirit was refreshing to read, even if it led her to make some frustrating choices. I do think that my students will enjoy it, and they probably won't even notice the issues that I had. This definitely wasn't as good as some of Nielsen's previous work, which was disappointing, but it is a story that young adult readers will like. This is just one of those books written for kids that doesn't have a lot of crossover appeal for more mature readers.


Challenge Tally

TBR Challenge: (previously owned) 47/60

Total Books Read in 2017: 60