Lockdown (Escape from Furnace, Book 1)

I put off these books for so long because the covers are seriously scary and it sounded like it could potentially be a mess. I really should have given Lockdown a chance sooner, though, because it was freaking awesome.

This book seriously packs in the adrenaline and feels. No, there's no romance. In fact, there's zero girls (I'll get to that in a few), but it didn't really matter because the story was great. It starts off with a bang and never really lets up.

On the creep factor: it was fantastic. How does this sound? Giant, skinless pitbulls and (human?) things with gas masks sewn into their faces. There were multiple (work) nights I was up later than I should have been because the adrenaline was just too much. I don't think I could've put the book down even if I tried.

Then there's the emotions. This is the first book I've gotten really invested in lately. Maybe it's because I wasn't really expecting an emotional investment, but by the end I was tearing up when people got removed from the story (by death or otherwise).

My one issue, and it's not even really an issue, where are the girls? I'm fine with a story without girls, but the description nor the story indicate anywhere that the prison is male-only that I can remember and yet there are no girls to be found. Maybe that's potential for a plot twist in later books? I still would've liked some acknowledgement, though.

The Nutshell: Lockdown is a fantastic horror that pulled me in and also managed to make me feel for the characters. I tend to distance myself from characters when it's a horror, but Smith managed to pull me in and get me invested. I'm really looking forward to the reading the next one. I actually already put it on hold at my library.

Hit/Direct Hit

This was a fast paced book and thriller to the end. Action packed from the first page. You really feel sorry for Alex and his friends and question the justice system. The writing made you flinch with every new creature that was described in this book. This is an adrenaline rush like I have never had from a YA book. With a cliff hanger ending that made me run to buy the next book in the series.

Kids these days are just a bunch of hoodlums. They don't got no respect. They're violent because of their video games and the like. It certainly is not too difficult to imagine that, should there be some event to set it off, that governments (and the people) might get the idea that some kids are irredeemable. Some people cannot be saved, cannot be turned into good citizens; they should be allowed to rot.

Of course, this is a serious waste of resources. They're not okay with the death sentence, but they're willing to condemn children to a life sentence without possibility of parole in a jail of horrors. Right. The logic of other people confuses me. Even though they don't give the boys much, this still has to be an incredibly expensive operation.

Then you have to factor in the fact that the folks running Furnace are framing boys for murder to add to the prison population, probably because they're dying off too fast, thanks to the violence of the guards and the violence of the inmates. I really am looking forward to continuing with the series. At the end of Lockdown, you don't know much. Basically, you know enough to know that some seriously bad shit is going down.

I mentioned that Alex was framed, and he was, but I what I have not yet stressed is the robbery part. Alex is not a good guy. He was a bully and graduated from stealing classmate's money to robbing homes. He definitely was a criminal. Even so, he does not deserve the treatment he's receiving in Lockdown. It's important to keep that in mind, because that's much of the point; this setting makes even the boys harsher than Alex seem somewhat sympathetic.

Lockdown will definitely appeal to teenage boys, full of violence and creepy monsters. Of course, don't let that limit you, because I enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to finding out more about the dystopian world that created Furnace.