Maximum Ride – Saving The World and Other Extreme Sports by James Patterson

My first introduction to a kid named Max with special abilities like having wings and being able to fly went back to the days of When The Wind Blows, first published in 1998 and subsequently Lake House, published in 2003. Along the years, I knew that James Patterson started a series with these characters under Young Adults Category. However, I never came across any of the books under this series until now....

When I pick this particular one up, I knew what I was getting myself into – a fast thrilling ride but what I didn’t expect was the difference between this series and the early days of When The Wind Blows. I guess I should have expected it seeing that they were written for different category of readers. James Patterson also claimed that the Max and her gang in these series are not the same Max that I mentioned from the above 2 books and follows a different but similar storyline. Hmm.... I hope you got that and how do I not think of them as the same Max. I think that’s rather difficult for someone who had read When The Wind Blows and Lake House not to identify this Max with the other Max.

Anyway, back to the differences, other than a different Max altogether, what’s the other differences, you ask? Well, for once, the writing is different. This is less descriptive, short sentences with matter-of-fact statements. Lots of cynical remarks, very technologically updated with references to blogs, emails, etc. I am sure it’s very appealing to targeted Young Adults. Very little on romance, just a hint of it here and there. Certainly very different from the Twilight Series.

Maximum Ride – Saving the World is actually the 3rd book into the series. The 1st two are The Angel Experiment and School’s Out Forever. The subsequent titles are The Final Warning, Max and Fang.

You can read this book just as it is without the earlier titles but it would be quite difficult to fully appreciate the storyline and who these group of ‘birdkids’are. The writing is fast paced and the chapters ere short and just over 2 -3 pages per chapter. However, I find the characters quite one dimensional. There’s no in-depth development there and I can’t understand how they can joke at times when their lives ere in danger. I find it pretty lame but perhaps that’s how young readers like it to be....

I finish reading it in just 2 days. It was published by Little Brown in hardcover and would have cost me RM48.50 (US14 or £8) but since I pick this up from the local library, no damage there.