"Gone" by Michael Grant

558 pages

Fourteen-year-old Sam Temple is sitting in American history class when all of the teachers and a few kids literally disappear in the blink of an eye. Soon, the students who remain realize that everyone over the age of 15 is gone--not just in their school, but the whole town. Sam teams up with Quinn, his best friend, and Astrid, a beautiful genius that Sam has a crush on, to find help. When they go a few miles, however, they discover that the town is surrounded by an impenetrable dome. Other unbelievable things begin to happen--animals mutate and some children start developing supernatural powers. Sam is just trying to keep everyone calm, but then a group of bullies start terrorizing everyone else, especially the ones with powers. And the leader, Caine, has a personal problem with Sam. On top of it all, the disappearing hasn't stopped--everyone who turns 15 disappears at the exact time they were born. Sam has only a few days until his 15th birthday, so he has to act fast to fight off Caine's groupies and figure out how to avoid "the poof" before his time runs out.

"Gone" seemed to me like a cross between "Lord of the Flies" and "X-Men". It grabbed my attention right away and held it all the way to the end. The events are so weird and unbelievable that I couldn't wait to get to the end to figure out what happened. There aren't many answers at the conclusion, but that makes sense because this is the first book in a series. I really liked the main premise--all of the adults disappearing and people continuing to disappear--but I think there is too much additional stuff going on. So many bizarre things happen that it's hard to keep track of and it seemed over-the-top to me. I can't imagine how the author is going to have it all make sense at the end, but I will wait until I've read all of the books to pass judgment about the overall plot. I really like the characters, especially Sam, and I am glad that most of the kids aren't clear-cut good and bad.They seem more real because they are multidimensional. Some of the "good" kids do bad things, and some of the "bad" kids do good things. I recommend this for anyone who likes fast-paced science fiction.