Book Review of "The People of Sparks" by Jeanne DuPrau

       

The People of Sparks by Jeanne DuPrau is the second book in the Book of Ember series, The City of Ember being the first.

Disappointed. The first book in the series was so intriguing, and I had high hopes for the second book in the series. There were points in this book that I certainly found to be of interest, the citizens of Ember have emerged from their underworld and are seeing our beautiful world for the first time. First being bewildered by their new habitat, and not understanding what it is that they are seeing, feeling, and hearing. Then encountering people. They discover that a small population of people have managed to survive through the great disaster, when they stumble upon a small village, the citizens there calling themselves the people of Sparks. I was extremely intrigued that the citizens of Sparks were actually less advanced then the citizens of Ember, not understanding the concept of electricity for example, but were more knowledgeable about the events that took place and of survival, as rather then be kept ignorant on the subjects like the citizens of Ember were kept, the citizens of Sparks made sure to pass their history down through the generations. But the citizens of Sparks aren't prepared to accommodate the sudden arrival of four hundred people, and despite not wanting to repeat the mistakes that their previous ancestors made, things between the villagers of Sparks and the citizens of Ember become tense ...

That was the pros on the one hand, on the other hand I found that all of the characters suddenly lacked a personality and were all suddenly dull and soulless. It seems that in the story, the author neglected one of the most important aspects to a book, the characters themselves. This book also felt a lot more juvenile then the previous book in the series, and lacked a certain amount of depth to it. The story itself was actually rather childish in comparison.

My Rating : ***