Title: The 100
Author: Kass Morgan
Narrator: Justin Torres & Phoebe Strole
Publication Date: September 3, 2013
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
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No one has set foot on Earth in centuries — until now.
Ever since a devastating nuclear war, humanity has lived on spaceships far above Earth’s radioactive surface. Now, one hundred juvenile delinquents — considered expendable by society — are being sent on a dangerous mission: to recolonize the planet. It could be their second chance at life…or it could be a suicide mission.
CLARKE was arrested for treason, though she’s haunted by the memory of what she really did. WELLS, the chancellor’s son, came to Earth for the girl he loves — but will she ever forgive him? Reckless BELLAMY fought his way onto the transport pod to protect his sister, the other half of the only pair of siblings in the universe. And GLASS managed to escape back onto the ship, only to find that life there is just as dangerous as she feared it would be on Earth.
Confronted with a savage land and haunted by secrets from their pasts, the hundred must fight to survive. They were never meant to be heroes, but they may be mankind’s last hope.
Let’s set the stage: In our future, humans have fled Earth and taken to living in space stations, because nuclear warfare and radiation has rendered our planet uninhabitable. Even the smallest crimes are taken very seriously on the space stations, and our story follows a group of teens who have been convicted of various crimes. 100 criminal teens are being sent to Earth to see if it can sustain human life once again. Of course, things don’t go according to plan, and the teens have to find a way to survive, while discovering just how much things have changed on Earth.
While I enjoyed listening to The 100, it didn’t really impress me very much. It was an interesting story, but never went deep enough for me to connect to the story or the characters. I have listened to this audiobook twice, and I am still confused about the relationships between all the characters. Clarke used to date Wells, who is best friends with Glass, who was dating Luke, who is now dating Camille, who I think is maybe friends with someone else. I honestly have no idea. There are so many connections and the point of view changed so often that I kept losing track of who had connections with other characters. The one character that I liked the most was Bellamy, but I didn’t develop any connection to or concern for the other characters.
While the story was interesting and full of action, some of the storytelling needed some work. For example, there is a scene where two space stations are sealed off from each other in an effort to preserve oxygen. Yet one of the characters climbs through the air ducts to get from one station to the other. If everything is sealed off to preserve oxygen, it shouldn’t be so easy to travel through the air ducts. It makes no sense. This is the most glaring example, but there were other instances in the book where I wished details had been more fleshed out. The concept of the story is really interesting, and I kept finding myself wanting more and getting let down.
All in all, the story was entertaining, but not one that will stick with me for a long time. I haven’t seen the TV show yet, but I can understand why so many people say the show is so much better. I can picture a lot of the scenes having great potential for TV. Seeing this story unravel on the screen will probably help to flesh out the details I was missing in the book. I enjoyed the story enough that I will probably listen to the next book at some point in the future. And I really want to finally watch the show. But unfortunately, I am already having trouble remembering a lot of details about the story because it didn’t have a tremendous impact on me.
