“Gone” Book Response REVISED
By Lucas Peterka
Michael Grant’s “Gone” is a loss of innocence story set around a character, Sam Temple, who has had the harshness of the world revealed to him in an apocalyptic situation. Sam is a teenage boy faced with the responsibility of leading his peers against known and unknown enemies. Grant focuses on the courage and maturity that can be found in any child; the courage and maturity that usually goes unnoticed by the rest of society. In the traumatic plot Grant has put before his teenage characters, we find their actions, thoughts, and feelings becoming more and more adult as the plot develops. Grant not only wants us to see the plot growing more complex and mature, but also see the children maturing along with it.
In the beginning of the book, we see Sam’s courage start to develop. After the adults disappear, a fire starts in a building in the town square. Sam, seeing the danger it poses, takes charge of his peers. Many of the older kids get to the abandoned fire station to retrieve hoses while Sam himself dives into the burning building to save a trapped child. With this small, little scene, we can see Grant introducing courage, determination, and leadership in these kids that will develop throughout the story. Sam taking charge shows us that inborn leadership that needed only the right situation to spark its development. The kids running to the station to retrieve the hoses for the building shows us the determination in those kids to save their town. But most importantly was Sam’s courage, jumping into that burning building to save a girl he didn’t know. Here, we see the plot already maturing, and along with it, our teenage characters.
We even find this courage and leadership in other characters. Caine, for example, even as the book’s “bad guy” has shown incredible abilities to lead and manipulate with his words. When Caine and his followers came down from Coates Academy, a school for “troubled kids”, to Perdido Beach, Sam and his peer’s town. Soon after Caine enters town, he gathers the entire town, and with one speech, practically takes over. Grant uses Caine and this scene to express a differen way to use the new maturing skills of leadership. Because Sam uses his leadership skills to lead fairly, he shows us Caine leading with the wit of his tongue. Grant shows us how maturing can lead to darker paths. With this scene, Grant shows us that with these attributes, the children can be both honorable and manipulative.
With this book, Grant hoped to make us that certain traits are found in all ages and sizes. And just like in adults, they can be used for, simply put, good and evil. Because maturity, courage, leadership, and determination are in everybody, even the “bad ones”. These traits give people power and how they use it is up to them. But in “Gone” people not only use this power however they want, it’s the kids who are using it. And to Michael Grant it is important that everybody realizes that everyone has an equal chance to become dangerous or protective, truthful or manipulative, good or bad. In Michael Grant’s “Gone” he shows us that maturity can mean very different things and can be used in very different ways.
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