Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment by James Patterson
This is the first book in a fairly popular young adult series by Patterson. I thought I’d read it to see what the fuss is about. I can see why the premise is appealing to young people – six kids ages 6-14 are on their own, have super-powers and have the ability to fly. However there are so many holes in the logic of the narrative that I am not very interested in reading further in the series. For example, Max (the female protagonist) is 14 and has only had about 4 years of worldly experience and yet is able to be mother to her ‘flock’ and seems knowledgeable in the ways of the wider world. Previous to those four years she was locked up in a cage as an animal. Second, these ‘bird-children’ are described as having very light bones so they are able to fly. But every time the bad guys come after them they have fights in which they are punched in the face, gut, etc. Do they suffer crippling injuries? Heavens no – they get up and are just fine the next day. It reminds me of t.v. cartoons. This isn’t written nearly as cleverly as the Harry Potter series. At least Rowling worked out a solution in her fantasy world for the protagonists to recover from their injuries: Madame Pomfrey was able to wave her wand to provide medical miracles of healing.