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The Underland Chronicles 2 and 3
May. 12th, 2013 10:10 amSuzanne Collins is famous for her trilogy The Hunger Games, but I'm sure few would know that she has another young adult series called The Underland Chronicles. It stars an average boy, Gregor, who is the hero of a cavernous and dangerous place under New York City. After fulfilling Book One's prophecy, he is naturally drawn back several more times as the Underlanders keep trying to decipher cryptic prose. In Book Two, he must defeat an enormous rat called The Bane and quests for a cure for a plague in Book Three. Book Three ends with a crazy cliffhanger that, if the fourth or fifth books were not already out, would have driven me mad :-D
Rather than discuss the plot of the two stories, I feel it is far more important to talk about just how much Collins packs into each of them. If the lessons of The Hunger Games were lost amid who Katniss would pick for a lover, they are certainly found again in The Underland Chronicles. The entire series is a mirror for the real world of diplomatic relations, war, poverty, hunger and racism. It becomes apparent after Book One that nothing is black and white in the Underland. The Underlanders chief enemies, the Gnawers (rats), are sympathetically portrayed, especially when the two sides need to co-operate to solve problems. And just as the rats are not entirely bad, the Underlanders are not entirely good either.
Possibly the greatest pleasure in this series is Gregor's development as he juggles supporting his family and his friends. Gregor is an amazingly human character, with faults and anxieties. He learns there are consequences to his actions, but this is done in a gentle and non-preachy way that doesn't interfere with the exciting plot twists and actions that Collins creates.
Rather than discuss the plot of the two stories, I feel it is far more important to talk about just how much Collins packs into each of them. If the lessons of The Hunger Games were lost amid who Katniss would pick for a lover, they are certainly found again in The Underland Chronicles. The entire series is a mirror for the real world of diplomatic relations, war, poverty, hunger and racism. It becomes apparent after Book One that nothing is black and white in the Underland. The Underlanders chief enemies, the Gnawers (rats), are sympathetically portrayed, especially when the two sides need to co-operate to solve problems. And just as the rats are not entirely bad, the Underlanders are not entirely good either.
Possibly the greatest pleasure in this series is Gregor's development as he juggles supporting his family and his friends. Gregor is an amazingly human character, with faults and anxieties. He learns there are consequences to his actions, but this is done in a gentle and non-preachy way that doesn't interfere with the exciting plot twists and actions that Collins creates.
