Stung

Starred review from March 15, 2013
Fiona Tarsis wakes up to a world of nightmares in this fast-paced, fever-bright post-apocalyptic adventure. Her brother's a monster, her Denver suburb's a wasteland, and she doesn't even recognize herself or the 10-legged tattoo on her hand. Fiona has no memory of the last four years or how the world changed, but she quickly learns how dangerous life is outside the wall. After seeking assistance from Arrin--a Fec, or sewer-dweller, of indeterminate gender and murky motives--Fiona is captured by the militia and seems destined for a short and painful life in a laboratory. Or worse--like all vaccinated children, Fiona bears the mark, and she could turn into a ravening beast at any moment--but she is also a female in a barren and depopulated world. Fiona loses her innocence but not her hope as she dives into chase scenes, gun battles, gladiatorial fights and a tentative romance with her rescuer/captor Dreyden Bowen. Wiggins (Shifting 2011) muses on the dangers of science and medicine and deftly maps out the chain of events that has led to catastrophe, creating a violent world vastly different from ours but still recognizable. With a stirring conclusion and space for a sequel, it's an altogether captivating story. Readers will gladly be bitten by this bug. (Science fiction. 12 & up)

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June 1, 2013

Gr 8 Up-The pesticide developed to kill genetically modified bees that caused a bee flu epidemic killed almost everything else as well, leaving a world in which women are scarce, honey is more valuable than gold, and survival is tenuous. Fiona Tarsis wakes in the ruin of her Colorado home with no memory of how she got there. Lack of recall, however, does not keep her from recognizing a feral attacker as her twin brother, Jonah, and her flight from him through a window is just the beginning of her narrow escapes. Fo is captured by the militia, guardians of the gates to a walled city. Bowen, a handsome neighbor from Fo's old life, fills in the gaps in her memory. She learns that parents, desperate to save their children, voluntarily put them into comas hoping to keep them stable until a cure for the epidemic was found. The plot relies on coincidence and cannot fully hide weaknesses in characterization with its breakneck speed. Fo was 13 when she went into the coma, and 17 when she awakens with a more mature body and a mind that seemingly continued to develop while she was comatose. The inevitable love story is handled with some heat. Fo reacts instead of acts in the simplistic role of girl in peril. Sent to fight to the death, she is protected in the arena by Jonah until Bowen rescues her in the nick of time. The conclusion is anticlimactic, but the roaring pace keeps world-building to a minimum and makes this a crashing dystopic roller-coaster ride.-Janice M. Del Negro, GSLIS Dominican University, River Forest, IL

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