This review is hard to put into words because I can honestly say, I'm not quite sure I fully understand what I read. I did get the gist of it and enjoyed it the whole time I was reading it but in the end, I'm still not fully sure. This book has a lot of details and a bunch of twists and turns. You have to be fully engaged and give it all your attention. I think if I was more fully focused, I may have understood it more. It had the feel of the movies Shutter Island and Inception with things not always being what they seem. I loved those two movies and still don't fully understand them. Sometimes, as in the case with this book, that's okay.
In this book, the story is set in the world of Prospera. Here everything is controlled. People marry under contracts and take on wards instead of having children. They have their jobs and live what seems to be a reliable life. The world here is split up in 3 sections. There is the main island where most live, there is the Nursery where you are taken when you are at the end of you life, and the Annex where the ones who work on keeping the island running are stationed. Our main character, Prosper Bennett, is the ferryman. He is the one who ferries people to the Nursery. There they will be made anew and sent back to the main island as wards (teenagers who will be adopted). But Prosper has a secret... he dreams. No one dreams there and it has caused him great anxiety. He questions his job and on a day when he decides it will be his last day of working there, he finds that his last passenger is his father. This sets off a maddening chain of events. Prosper starts to see things in a different light and there are those who will do anything to stop him.
I was easing into the story when the bit with his father came up. Soon after that, we go down a rabbit hole. It was totally mesmerizing and insane. My mind was completely blown away. One day I hope to revisit this story. Maybe at a time when my brain is quiet and willing to absorb every part of it.
In this book, the story is set in the world of Prospera. Here everything is controlled. People marry under contracts and take on wards instead of having children. They have their jobs and live what seems to be a reliable life. The world here is split up in 3 sections. There is the main island where most live, there is the Nursery where you are taken when you are at the end of you life, and the Annex where the ones who work on keeping the island running are stationed. Our main character, Prosper Bennett, is the ferryman. He is the one who ferries people to the Nursery. There they will be made anew and sent back to the main island as wards (teenagers who will be adopted). But Prosper has a secret... he dreams. No one dreams there and it has caused him great anxiety. He questions his job and on a day when he decides it will be his last day of working there, he finds that his last passenger is his father. This sets off a maddening chain of events. Prosper starts to see things in a different light and there are those who will do anything to stop him.
I was easing into the story when the bit with his father came up. Soon after that, we go down a rabbit hole. It was totally mesmerizing and insane. My mind was completely blown away. One day I hope to revisit this story. Maybe at a time when my brain is quiet and willing to absorb every part of it.
