23 February 2025
Teen Librarian
Teen Librarian
Thunder City by Philip Reeve
The book is set in a sci-fi world where there are moving cities. In the beginning, the flying city of Thorbury is taken over by the former Chief of Planning, Strega. Strega has plans to use the city to take over other cities, and he puts his plan in motion. He kills the mayor and uses mercenaries to oppress the people of Thorbury. Ms. Lavinia Torpenhow flees the city to find Max, who was the mayor's son. However, Max is locked in a prison in Paris that is guarded by a mechanical monstrosity which is known as a Revenant. To help defeat the Revenant, she heads to the city of Margate to free one of the slaves there. The slave she has in mind is Tamzin Pook, who is an Arcade slave which are forced to fight Revenants akin to the one guarding Max. However, the Arcade's Revenants are weaker than the prison guard one to help appease the crowd better. Despite this, Tamzin agrees to help Ms. Torpenhow free Max. The three escape the prison and Tamzin decides to stay with the group. Now, the trio have a mission to free Thorbury and stop Strega from terrorizing the world.
This book was wonderful and had very vivid details throughout. The plot is wonderful and deeply emotional at times, and reels the reader into the story. I enjoyed seeing the character's personalities and desires. My favorite one was Tamzin's, because she was a slave for her whole life and only knows how to kill Revenants. Despite this, she is a very strong and brave character, and has the biggest character arch out of all the characters in this novel. She is also shown to be paranoid at certain times due to her life in the Arcade. However, I also think that Strega needed to be shown more often in the book, and it was deeply frustrating to see that the overarching villain wasn't seen much.
This world this book is set in is unique and an unexplored concept that I heavily enjoyed. It was great to see how things in this world would work, and how this world's technological advances were debated by different groups of people. It was also great to see how technology was used and exploited to be in favor of some, but hurting others. It helps make the book more realistic and also more fun to read.
Reviewed by Shaurya S., Twin Hickory
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