Sunday 9 July 2017

The Girl with all the Gifts (Collaborative Post) - M.R. Carey

The Girl with All the Gifts.jpg
Penny : What did you think of girl with all the gifts?

Joel : I thought it was quite pretty in the way it was told. In the sense of the girl [Melanie] has such an innocent way of looking at life. Even though she's not really human, she's blissful. She learns so much but shes never really scared other than of loosing her friends (as far as I can remember).

Penny : Did you like the characters?

Joel : Justineau is an incredible mother figure but Parks tends to turn her into a bit of a sex object. She puts her life at risk rather than Melanie's and in some parts she was blinded by wanting to help Melanie out more than to survive and she'd put the group at risk for that because of her guilt over her past.

I didn't know what to think about the ending.

Penny : I thought it was a bit of a kick in the teeth for Justineau in that she now has no-one her own age to talk to and the solitude will probably really hurt her in the future but at the same time she can't end it like parks did because she now has this duty to be the template for the humanity in the Hungry children.

Joel : There were times when I really didn't like parks. I could tell he was trying to be defensive and keeping people in line to make sure they were safe but the way he did it was wrong. He was talking to civilians, not soldiers. The opinion that he's the only one that can be right caused the other characters to deviate and put themselves in danger in order to be heard. His attitude changed and his style of leading changes. He considers other peoples opinions and feelings more throughout the novel.

Caldwell was a hardhearted but hard working scientist that was looking for the cure to the pathogen.

Penny : She felt she was the hero of the story even if the people in the group detested her. As a character I thought she was the most complex and well written.

Joel : That still doesn't make the things she did good. She would hurt other people just to give her an edge to discovering the cure and treated Melanie and the other Hungry children as just another slab of meat ready to be dissected.

Penny : At the same time Caldwell played an important role in helping Melanie reach her own conclusion that the era of the humans had ended and that there would be no cure. Melanie grew Doctor Caldwell's ideas and flipped them on their head.

Joel : Overall it was well written and the character development is definitely worth talking about but the ending leaves you wanting more in that it's quite abrupt.

Penny : I agree about the character development but the abrupt ending I thought was a good shock tactic and completely unexpected! 


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