Book Review of "The City of Ember" by Jeanne DuPrau

The city of Ember was designed and created by The Builders in a attempt to preserve human life in case things got worse above ground. The underground city was built to contain a small town, with a seemly limitless supply of both food, and material, to sustain them. The Builders intended for the citizens of Ember to live below ground for two hundred and twenty years, at which time it would hopefully be safe for them to venture up. To do this, they not only kept the citizens ignorant of the outside world, but they left instructions on the means of leaving the underground city, that would open after two hundred and twenty years. This safe box was entrusted to the mayor of the city, and later handed down to the future mayors. One of which was careless with it, and the box became lost. Roughly two hundred and fifty years after Ember was built, the city is dying. The lights have begin to flicker, and what is known as the black outs is starting to happen. The lights go out, and each time they are out for a longer period of time. The lights created by the generator are the only light source in Ember, so when they go out the city is pitch black. The lights not only serve as a means of being able to see underground, but also as a food source by means of growing plants out in the greenhouse. The food, and all of the supplies, are also running short. The city of Ember was never meant to run for this long, and everything is starting to give out.

Everything seems lost, until two twelve year old children, Lina Mayfleet and Doon Harrow, find the lost box. The box opened roughly twenty five years earlier and the instructions are almost unreadable. Can they find the way out?

And if they find the way out, can they survive? The citizens of Ember don't know what the sky is. They don't know what the sun or the moon are. They don't know what grass or trees are. None of these exist in their world, and The Builders intended to keep them ignorant on this, so the generations wouldn't know what they were missing. If you don't know about it, can you miss it? Perhaps.

My Rating : ****