Book Review - The 100 (The Hundred #1) By: Kass Morgan

Title: The 100 (The Hundred #1)
Author: Kass Morgan
Publisher: Hodder & Staughton, 336 pages, (August 29th 2013)
From: The Works book shop
Format: Paperback
Add to: Goodreads
Order a copy: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, The Book Depository, Amazon UK

Synopsis: 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 re-colonize 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 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.

Review: 3 stars - I picked up The 100 in The Works not long after I’d seen the television series start. I’d heard very mixed reviews about it- some people love it and others hated it. I decided to give it a read as I had seen the first few episodes of the series and had enjoyed it.

One thing I will say is that if you have watched the series before you read the book, you may get confused because some of the characters and their attributes are different between the two and even some characters don’t even exist in the book. I thankfully wasn’t that far into the series before I started reading, but I have still been thinking about the television show characters and trying to think who people are while reading.

The 100 are a group of young convicts sent from a space station back to planet Earth years after a nuclear war happened. They have been sent to try and re-colonize the earth, by the council on the ship.

None of them are prepared for what happens. Unknown to the inhabitants of the ship; they are suddenly taken from confinement in the prison, loaded on to a ship and sent to Earth.

Clarke Griffin was a trainee doctor before she was put in confinement for treason. I can’t figure out if I like Clarke or not. At times I like her and the fact that she is treating the wounded when the drop ship crash lands on earth. At other times, when she’s randomly kissing a stranger and then when she forgives Wells- she makes my blood boil. You’ve just crash landed on a planet- there are other things to think about.

Bellamy is the older brother of Octavia. He has always strived to keep her safe and for a few years of her life he helped his mother keep her existence a secret- only one child to each parent on the space station.

Bellamy fought his way onto the drop ship to protect his sister, attacking the Chancellor in the process. Although the way he goes about it might not always be correct, Bellamy has only ever tried to protect Octavia and doesn’t necessarily care who gets hurt in the process. He is also a little blind to what Octavia is really like. To me he is the most likeable character in the book.

Wells, the Chancellor’s son, is in love with Clarke. He committed a crime to get himself confined so he could be with her. I really didn’t like his character. Although he was doing the right thing in reporting Clarke’s parents for experimenting on children, he broke her trust and ended up landing her in confinement too. He seems to think he can win back her trust easily, I hope Clarke is stronger than to let that happen in the next book.

Glass was sent to confinement because of something that happened. In the process of this act she broke the Gaia Doctrine. Before that she was happily in love with a boy named Luke who lived in one of the other sectors on the ship. She shouldn’t have been in a relationship with him really and it was frowned upon by her mother and some of the other Phoenix residents. When she was confined, she just disappeared and Luke didn’t know what happened to her. When Bellamy attacks the Chancellor as the 100 are being put on the drop ship, Glass manages to make a run for it. The only thing Glass doesn’t know is her escape might not be for the best and she still might be at risk.

I did enjoy the book, but because I was trying to compare the characters to those in the television series I think I ruined it for myself.

The book swaps between 4 points of view- Glass, Clarke, Bellamy and Wells. This is easy to follow as long as you read the chapter headers. I forgot to check a few times at the beginning of the book and had to go back and check who I was reading about. I have to admit I didn’t form a connection with any of the characters though, which I normally like to do.

Overall I think The 100 is a good base for setting the scene and the back stories of the characters. I’m intrigued to find out what happens next as the book finishes on a bit of a cliff hanger.

Great read for fans of The Hunger Games, The Maze Runner and Divergent.
If you have seen the television series- read the books with an open mind.