Review of The Adoration of Jenna Fox (Recommended!)

This science fiction novel is about a girl trying to rediscover what it means to be alive and come to terms with the accident that led to her year-long coma and the deaths of her former best friends.  Unfortunately, the answers she seeks aren’t ones that her parents want uncovered.  

           

This novel is full of mystery.  Author Mary E. Pearson gives us a glimpse of a future after rampant disease has killed millions due to the world’s built-up immunity to antibiotics.  This is a world in which an organization has been developed to keep researchers, scientists, and doctors in check, because it is believed that their unmonitored actions within the healthcare community caused this great plague.  If antibiotics hadn’t been handed out so recklessly, this super-virus would have never evolved. 

And unbeknownst to Jenna, her entire existence lies at the heart of the debate.  In fact, her survival after the accident is itself illegal, which is why when she wakes, she finds her parents have moved her to the other side of the country and bought a house under her grandmother’s name.

           

After some weeks spent recovering – remembering fractions of her old life, relearning commonly-used words, and recognizing and recreating facial expressions in an effort to understand emotions, Jenna demands to attend school.  Instead of enrolling her in the public school system, she finds herself in an alternative education setting with other misfits of society. 

Through her interactions with her new, out-casted peers, her friendship with an elderly neighbor, and her complex relationship with her grandmother, Jenna begins to piece together a puzzle, which threatens her moral integrity.  In the end, she is faced with a great decision – one far more complicated than simply life or death.  And it is this intrigue and suspense, which keeps a reader captivated throughout the entire book.

           

Pearson manages to meld moments of verse – Jenna’s internal battle – with prose to make a book that is not only fascinating and exciting, but also beautifully artistic in its delivery.

It is through her struggles to adapt to her new life, her determination to find answers, and courage in the face of great ethical choices that we learn to love, respect, and yes, adore Jenna Fox.  In fact, the question begs to be answered:  Can a person be loved too much?

Great read!!!!!  I read it in one sitting. ;)

Author's Website:  http://www.marypearson.com/