MONUMENT 14 BY EMMY LAYBOURNE

ISBN: 9780312569037
Publisher: Feiwel& Friends (Macmillan)
Pages: 294
Formats Available: Hardback


BLURB from Goodreads
Your mother hollers that you’re going to miss the bus. She can see it coming down the street. You don’t stop and hug her and tell her you love her. You don’t thank her for being a good, kind, patient mother. Of course not—you launch yourself down the stairs and make a run for the corner.Only, if it’s the last time you’ll ever see your mother, you sort of start to wish you’d stopped and did those things. Maybe even missed the bus.But the bus was barreling down our street, so I ran.Fourteen kids. One superstore. A million things that go wrong. 

In Emmy Laybourne’s action-packed debut novel, six high school kids (some popular, some not), two eighth graders (one a tech genius), and six little kids trapped together in a chain superstore build a refuge for themselves inside. While outside, a series of escalating disasters, beginning with a monster hailstorm and ending with a chemical weapons spill, seems to be tearing the world—as they know it—apart.


MY REVIEW
The cover straight away suggested dystopian/post apocalyptic to me, the figures standing out stark against the dirty black/grey sky.
The book is well written, it has plenty going all throughout the whole book. The books main characters are the 14 kids of varying school ages that end up in a large superstore taking shelter form the disaster outside.
The six high school aged kids have totally different personalities and characteristics yet after some initial ups and downs manage to pull together as a team and take care and protect the younger kids. Then there are two kids from eighth grade neither fitting in the high school group nor the young kids group, but they also play their own important part within how things take shape in the supermarket. finally there is the little ones, who may only be small and each have their very own quirks and need still have something to contribute to the group, their own little community is formed.
The main character , who is telling us the story is Dean, the sporty cool guy Jake calls Dean "booker" as Dean is into books and such like.Dean is telling us the story as he has taken notebook and pen to write down everything that happens. Dean is the only one who has family with him, as he has his younger brother Alex. Alex just happens to be a techy guy, if a gadget is broken he can usually fix it or adapt it to get it to work.
I really got right into this book looking forward to my next reading session. I read this book in just two sittings! I read the first couple of chapters late one night and then read the rest a day after, I couldn't put it down, I had to continue reading to find out what happens. As with all groups of kids their are disagreements, love interests, as well as a little fighting here and there too. Decisions have to be made, so there's a vote for a leader between the cool fit guy Jake and Niko, the boy scout guy, who wins? You need to read the book to find out. There are tough decisions to make and tough actions and duties to be carried out. All the kids manage to pull together.....most of the time. Even in the aftermath of the initial disaster (you'll read more about what and how things happened in the book) there are moments of humour and comedy, in fact, there are little slivers of comedy throughout. One of my favourites is one of the girls taking charge when they have all caught nits from the little kids! How Emmy describes the situation in detail helps you literally visualize the comedy of it. there are also tragic scenes played out and you read the "lies" or stories the older kids make up to protect the little ones. the older kids do a good job of distracting the younger kids and keeping them busy and even productive too.
So did I enjoy the book? Yes. Would I read a Bk2? Yes please!! would I read more by Emmy Laybourne? Yes Would I recommend? Yes, I would compare this book to Ashfall by Mike Mullin.

Available at Amazon.co.uk