Posted by DonnaPublished Date: March 22nd, 2012
Finished Date: March 16th, 2012
Publishers: Mira Ink
Source: For Review
Format: Paperback
Pages: 207
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The Blurb from Goodreads: This is a world without parents. There are nurturers – women who bear and raise children, and breeders – men whose only obligation is to produce three offspring and then leave. No responsibilities, no involvement, no contact. This is a world devoid of paternal relationships, of parental homes, of families.
Micky “Monkey” Gibbon is counting down the days until graduation – until he can leave high school, start playing professional football, breed with his high-school crush, Angel, and enjoy living the life of a breeder. He can’t understand why his best mate, Tragic, is so sceptical. Who wouldn’t want to escape the oppressive rules of the TREACLE regime (Training and Resources for Educating Adolescent Children in a Loving Environment), where there’s unrest on the streets and frequent disappearances? Life couldn’t get better. Until Tragic disappears…
A mysterious clue left in Tragic’s abandoned house opens a whole plethora of questions. Enlisting the help of Angel, Micky embarks on a desperate quest to find his friend, but each step closer to Tragic is a step away from the safety of the world he thought he knew.
Angel and Micky want to uncover the truth, and in the process determine the paths their own lives will take…but rebellion comes at a high price. Angel and Monkey must choose between what is accepted, and what they think is right. Complicated by forbidden love and intertwined with fear, Toxic Treacle is a provocative consideration of what family, masculinity, and fatherhood really mean today.
The Review: I had not heard of this book or the author before so when I was asked to review it by the publishers, I said yes straight away because I had been on a high dystopian kick a few weeks ago and I’ve been looking for the next big thing since then. And while I think Toxic Treacle is a fast paced, fun and intriguing novel, it wasn’t my favourite dystopian this year but it was still worth a read.
I won’t go into to many details about the book because if you’ve read the blurb above, your’ll pretty much know what the story is about, but what intrigued me about Toxic Treacle is that the males are breeders and the women are left to raise the children on their own with no help from the males. This was like nothing I’ve ever read before and it had a very strong fountain and as I read each page, the stronger and stronger the story got. It was a very unique story and I felt the author did a great job trying to creating some fresh and new.
With Monkey – ergh, I’ll be honest, I hate that name and I much prefer Micky…but anyway with him nearly being at the age to start breeding, I liked that he started to question things and this was mainly because of his friend’s disappearance but also for her his love for Angel. He always liked to go off a play football which is forbidden but he was a little bit of a rebel, so I think he was the perfect person to start investigating. Deep down he really wants to shape his life and do the things he wants to do rather than have someone dictating to him and him and Angel really worked well together as a team. Now I really liked Angel, she was a sweet character and I loved how dedicated she was to Monkey. Their romance was really touching and I loved them together.
Even though I really liked the story, I did feel there was something missing…hence the three star rating but the problem is, I can’t quite put my finger on the problem. I did feel the ending was slightly rushed and with the book only being 200 pages maybe it could have been longer…umm…even now I’m not sure but overall, it was a good read and I’ll look out for more work by this author in the future.
1 comment:
Great review, Donna! It's a shame you felt like there was something missing, but this still sounds like a pretty good read. I haven't heard of it before so thanks for drawing my attention to it. :)
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