6 Rated Books Book Reviews

Book Review: The Game by Monica Hughes

Title: The Game (previously published as Invitation to The Game)

Author: Monica Hughes

Genre: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Young Adult

Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publication Date: October 2010 (originally published February 1991)
Paperback: 183 pages

Itโ€™s the future, and most jobs are done by machines. Now that school is over, Lisse and her friends are consigned to a bleak neighborhood for the permanently unemployed. Then they receive an invitation to the Gameโ€”which transports them to a paradise. Is it a dream, or a computer simulation? Each time they play the Game, the new world seems more and more real….

Netting more than 75,000 copies when it was originally published as Invitation to the Game in 1991, this title continues to be a favorite, and, with its eye-catching new package, will reach an eager new audience hungry for dystopian stories.

Stand alone or series: Standalone novel

How did I get this book: Bought

Why did I read this book: This previously published early ’90s book has been coming up in talks with other dystopian-minded bibliophiles (including the wonderful author Megan Crewe who mentioned the book as one of her favorite YA dystopians in this month’s newsletter!), and when I learned that Simon & Schuster had recently republished the book, I knew I had to track it down and give it a shot. Although I must say, I think I prefer the totally rad 1990s cover to the bland reissued version. Look at that Virtual Reality madness! The colors! LIGHTNING! It’s so bad…it’s good.

Review:

In the year 2154, overcrowding is the world’s biggest problem. For Lisse and her friends, graduating from their government sponsored school is a time of morbid dread, because even though she and her classmates have graduated with honors and have surpassed all expectation in their final exams, they are surplus population. With androids taking over tasks both menial and specialized, there isn’t anything available for newly minted high school graduates – certainly not college, and no career prospects. When Lisse’s graduation day comes around, she learns that her worst fear has come true with three brief sentences:

CONGRATULATIONS ON GRADUATING WITH HONORS!
ENJOY YOUR LEISURE YEARS!
USE THEM CREATIVELY.

With seven other friends, Lisse is driven to the City and dropped off in her “Designated Area”. Given a monthly allowance by the government to cover shelter, food, and the bare necessities, Lisse and her friends decide to pool their knowledge and resources and try to make it, together, in this strange, terrifying new world, teeming with youthful unemployed with nothing but time on their hands. As the group becomes acclimated to their new surroundings, they learn about a mysterious diversion that promises riches and treasure. A diversion known, in whispered tones, as The Game.

A secret affair, The Game can be accessed by invitation only – and Lisse and her crew have just received their summons. The Game is an alternate reality like nothing like they have ever felt before, and Lisse and her friends become ever-deeper immersed in the experience, hungry for their next invitation. But what is The Game? What is its purpose? And why have Lisse and her friends been chosen?

Prior to last year, I had not heard of The Game (nor had I seen anything of its glorious 1991 original cover) – and you know, it’s funny how you can tell the era a book was written in by the tropes present. Though it has been repackaged for the era of The Hunger Games, from the prose to the characterizations, the quick plotting to the tropes, this is very much an early ’90s science fiction/dystopia. And you know what? Despite the lack of in-depth characterization or emotion, I liked it. I liked it a lot.

Easily, the strongest aspect of The Game lies with its overall conceptualization and its plot. Like an episode of The Twilight Zone, The Game relies on a strong central hook, the ensuing conflict, and a helluva twist at the end to tie it all together. I love the theme at the heart of the book and how oddly socially relevant it is today: there’s the problem of unemployment, especially of intelligent, motivated, and educated youth who are unable to procure jobs by no real fault of their own as there simply aren’t any jobs to be had. With robots able to do tasks faster and cheaper than the human populace (hello, outsourcing parallel), and the snide attitudes of the employed resenting the taxes they have to pay in order to keep the unemployed fed and housed (sound familiar?), it’s almost eerie how much the issues in The Game mimic today’s socio-economic issues. I loved that The Game‘s society is a true dystopia – on a superficial level, it’s kind of a Utopia in that the populace need not work, their needs are generally catered for by the state and taxpayers. On a deeper level, the state controls the populace with Orwellian Thought Police, through limited means and absolute control of credits, communication and transportation, and of course through The eponymous Game itself. Also, I loved the “twist” that pulls the book together – thought-provoking and deeply rooted in full-blown SF territory, I was not expecting the final level of The Game, and I love the path down which Monica Hughes takes readers. (Sorry, can’t say more for fear of spoilers! Suffice to say, it’s good, dear readers. It is good.)

These praises said, I do feel like certain elements of the book were lacking – most importantly, the characterizations, especially that of our narrator Lisse. Utterly passive and strangely detached, there’s a hollowness to Lisse’s narrative that makes her seem like a passenger to her own story – we learn much more about the characters of Scylla or Katie, or even Alden than we do Lisse, who spends a lot of time sitting and watching, catching up when she falls behind, and playing peacekeeper. There’s nothing really endearing or defining about Lisse as a character, which is a huge drawback to the novel.

From a writing perspective, my reaction to The Game is hard to scale. It’s interesting to me because clearly, there’s enough meat in The Game to protract the story across a trilogy of books spanning a thousand pages – yet this novel is a standalone that finishes the job in less than 200 pages. It’s a kind of interesting examination of the YA market today versus what it used to be in the early ’90s. So many of my favorite books as a tween and teen (hello, Christopher Pike!) were standalone novels very much like The Game – brilliant in concept, but perhaps less indulgent in the characterization and emotional explication. By the end of the book, too, there’s a lot of telling and characters sitting around theorizing (thus explaining) their predicament in lieu of showing. Had Ms. Hughes been writing in today’s market, I’m certain Lisse would be quite a different character, and The Game expanded over multiple volumes. I’m not sure which era is better for YA Speculative Fiction – but it’s an interesting contrast, at the very least.

While I felt like this book could have used a lot of beefing up, particularly in the character department, for what it is – one of those glorious neon packaged books that you would devour in a bus ride as a tween reader (fellow nerds, you know what I’m talking about) – The Game completely succeeds. For anyone yearning for a kickback to nostalgic ’80s/’90s style YA SF, this one’s for you.

Notable Quotes/Parts: From Chapter 1:

It was the last day of school and the terror of the previous weeks had crept up on me again. My classmates were already gathering in the Assembly Room for what we jokingly called the Last Rites, and I had run upstairs to the dormitory for my journal, forgotten under my pillow in the excitement of the Last Day.

I was only just in time. The domestic robots were already busy stripping the beds, bundling up the sheets for the laundry, and folding the blankets into neat rectangles, each topped by a pillow, to be placed on the mattresses. I rescued my journal and from the robot’s claw and stood with it tight against my chest, staring out of the window, trying to control my shivers.

The Government School, which had been my home for the last ten years, had been built three hundred years before in what would later become part of a national forest. From the dormitory window I could see softly rolling hills, the morning mist caught in their folds, and a small grove through which ran the road connecting the school with the main highway, out of sight somewhere beyond the trees and the mist.

A small procession of electric buses appeared from among the trees and scrunched up the gravel road to park in front of the main entrance. At the sight of them panic gripped me. My mouth went dry and my stomach churned. Within the next few hours I would be aboard one of those buses, heading off into the unknown, to some place where I would have to spend the rest of my life doing…doing what? I pressed my head against the cold glass and longed to be someone else, somewhere else, sometime else…

Rating: 6 – Good

Reading Next: Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi

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20 Comments

  • Sara
    January 10, 2012 at 7:05 am

    Blast from the past! This was my favorite book in 6th grade – in fact, I think it was even assigned in my GT class. I’d totally forgotten about it until I saw that awesome cover.

  • Diana Peterfreund
    January 10, 2012 at 7:37 am

    I LOVE THIS BOOK! I read it in middle school too. Guys, come on — a bump in rating for it being from another era, please! (If you’d had the 90s cover, I know that would have made it a seven at LEAST.)

    Very interesting what you say about how if it had been published today, they probably would have made it a trilogy. There also probably would have been a love triangle. ๐Ÿ˜‰ But rather than the whole “oh, it’s missing characterization” — think about the blockbuster novels at the time. Michael Crichton’s SF wasn’t exactly known for its deep insight into the human experience. This was the style.

    What I think standalones like Invitation to the Game do that is missing from a lot of the dystopian series coming out these days is the whole story is right there. I’ve read too many “first book in a series” recently where it seems to end right as it’s getting good, because the author has been forced to stretch out a story into 1000 pages or whatever.

  • Thea
    January 10, 2012 at 8:27 am

    Sara – AWESOME! I can’t help but think this would’ve been a book I’d have loved to read in middle school. I love coming across forgotten gems from a nerdy childhood ๐Ÿ™‚

    Diana – You know, I wavered for the longest time between a 6 and a 7 primarily because of the reasons you mention! And if I had the sweet 90s version book, I may have bumped it up just because it is THAT awesome.

    Seriously though, I do completely get what you mean by the differences in eras and how writing changes over time – I think the thing that made me stick with the 6, though, is the fact that I’ve read fantastic books from the same era that do have solid characterization (Lois Lowry and Christopher Pike, namely), and while I adored the concept of this book, it wasn’t on the same level.

    What I think standalones like Invitation to the Game do that is missing from a lot of the dystopian series coming out these days is the whole story is right there. Iโ€™ve read too many โ€œfirst book in a seriesโ€ recently where it seems to end right as itโ€™s getting good, because the author has been forced to stretch out a story into 1000 pages or whatever.

    Preach it! I wholeheartedly agree. I LOVED that this book was so contained, without extraneous/unnecessary filler.

  • Linds @ Bibliophile Brouhaha
    January 10, 2012 at 8:33 am

    I never heard of this one, but it looks like it well-worth the read. I was in middle school around this time, but I think I was obsessed with Cynthia Voight books at the time. I miss the inclusion of more sci-fi stuff in books. Looking forward to picking this one up!

  • Diana Peterfreund
    January 10, 2012 at 8:41 am

    I have the sweet 90s cover (that is, if my mom didn’t toss it. I really hope she didn’t toss it.)

  • Bibliotropic
    January 10, 2012 at 11:12 am

    I adore this book, and have loved it for a good decade and a half now. I reread it quite often, and one of the biggest things I take away from it is inspiration, and hope that the skills that may seem useless now may someday prove to be what I need to live my life enjoyably. I highly recommend this book!

  • Megan Crewe
    January 10, 2012 at 1:58 pm

    The ending twist is what made he book for me! ๐Ÿ™‚

    I highly recommend you check you my fave of Monica Hughes’ books, THE KEEPER OF THE ISIS LIGHT. It’s science fiction but not dystopian, with a similarly great twist, but the main character has a much stronger personality and more emotional conflict. I *think* DEVIL ON MY BACK does better with the character development too, though it’s been longer since I re-read that one.

  • Phoebe North
    January 10, 2012 at 2:51 pm

    Oh man, I loved this one as a teen too (maybe that’s one of the reasons I dig Diana’s books so much–similar roots!). I had no idea it had gotten a rerelease! Time to buy . . .

    (Oooh and I have a copy of ISIS LIGHT that I hadn’t even read yet. Had no idea they were the same author! commence nostalgic squeeing.)

  • shel
    January 10, 2012 at 4:30 pm

    Ditto on The Keeper of the Isis Light recommendation (it is the first of a trilogy).

    I haven’t read this book, but I remember reading glomming ALL of the author’s backlist that my elementary school library carried (mostly the sci fi titles), good times.

  • Ashley
    January 18, 2012 at 12:26 am

    Wow I had a total flashback when I saw you had reviewed this book its one of my favorites from my childhood in fact I still have an original 90s copy with the crazy cover art lol ๐Ÿ™‚

  • KMont
    January 18, 2012 at 5:45 pm

    Oh, I had my eye on this one last year! Nice to see that it was a good read for you in some respects. I need to check and see what the ebook price is. The smaller page count might be what my limited reading time needs. Loved your comparisons to YA past and present!

  • Book Review: Earthseed by Pamela Sargent | The Book Smugglers
    February 23, 2012 at 10:32 am

    […] older SF titles like Earthseed, there’s the question of datedness. Having read and reviewed Monica Hughes’ The Game earlier this year, there certainly is something to be said for the context and point of time in […]

  • Anonymous
    May 12, 2012 at 9:10 pm

    8) 8) ๐Ÿ™„ ๐Ÿ˜ˆ ๐Ÿ˜† ๐Ÿ˜† ๐Ÿ˜› ๐Ÿ˜› ๐Ÿ˜›

  • Anonymous
    May 15, 2012 at 11:55 am

    ๐Ÿ™‚ ๐Ÿ˜€ ๐Ÿ˜ โžก โ“ โ— :mrgreen: ๐Ÿ˜ฅ ๐Ÿ˜ณ ๐Ÿ˜ˆ

  • jc
    March 17, 2014 at 4:52 pm

    xjs

  • jc
    March 17, 2014 at 4:53 pm

    love it

  • Anonymous
    April 1, 2016 at 10:27 am

    yes

  • Anonymous
    April 1, 2016 at 10:28 am

    my name is aleks

  • Anonymous
    May 10, 2017 at 9:46 pm

    I hope she didn’t toss out your book

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