Another Review at MyShelf.Com

Little Brother

by Cory Doctorow



      Obviously the title is a reference to 1984 and is one book that Orwell himself would, I am sure, applaud. In this "almost off the headlines" story, San Francisco has been the site of a terrorist attack. The Bay Bridge has been bombed and thousands of commuters have been killed, including those who drowned in the flooded subway tunnels - tunnels they thought would safely take them away from the destruction.

Homeland Security sweeps into the aftermath and quickly arrests a group of techno-savvy kids who just happened to have been playing an ARG in the vicinity of the bombing. The teens are taken off-shore, detained, and interrogated. Brutal tactics are utilized which are immediately recognizable by anyone who has read a newspaper or watched a senate investigation on CNN in the past year.  One member of the group does not return home.  Those allowed their freedom soon realize that neither they nor their families and friends are free at all.   Terrified and under continued surveillance by their own government, the teens - led by M1k3y - decide to take down the HSA through an XNet campaign for freedom.

Though I am not a tech-wizard, I could not manage to put this book down (reading it through in one day, often holding the book in one hand while searching internet sites with the other). Little Brother is marketed for a teen audience, but should / must be read by everyone interested in security vs. safety and in the "terrorist-under-every-bush" (all puns intended) state we currently find ourselves enduring."

The Book

Tor Teen
April 29, 2008
Hardcover
978-0-7653-1985-2
Teen / Young Adult Fiction / ages 14 - 21
More at Amazon.com
Excerpt
NOTE: Language and Violence

The Reviewer

Louanne Clayton Jacobs
Reviewed 2008
NOTE:
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