Reading level: Ages 12-17
Add this book to your collection: Starters
Video courtesy of RandomBooks: Survival is just the beginning.
HER WORLD IS CHANGED FOREVER
Callie lost her parents when the Spore Wars wiped out everyone between the ages of twenty and sixty. She and her little brother, Tyler, go on the run, living as squatters with their friend Michael and fighting off renegades who would kill them for a cookie. Callie’s only hope is Prime Destinations, a disturbing place in Beverly Hills run by a mysterious figure known as the Old Man.
He hires teens to rent their bodies to Enders—seniors who want to be young again. Callie, desperate for the money that will keep her, Tyler, and Michael alive, agrees to be a donor. But the neurochip they place in Callie’s head malfunctions and she wakes up in the life of her renter, living in her mansion, driving her cars, and going out with a senator’s grandson. It feels almost like a fairy tale, until Callie discovers that her renter intends to do more than party—and that Prime Destinations’ plans are more evil than Callie could ever have imagined. . . .
©2012 The Childrens Book Review. All Rights Reserved.
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Lissa Price the fantastic debut author of the equally amazing book Starters will be signing copies at COSTCO on 2901 Los Feliz Blvd. from 1pm-3pm. She also mentions that there will be swag as well. Now I just finished this book and if I lived in the LA area I would totally go and buy many copies to give away to friends who are looking for a great story that will keep you guessing until the very end. In fact it still has me guessing! Plus this cover is so amazing and I found out from Lissa herself that there is an short story e-book regarding the cover of this book! I will link to it below. My review of this terrific YA science fiction/dystopian thriller will be forthcoming!
Links to the Portrait of a Starter:
Lissa (pronounced LISS-sa) studied with Caroline Leavitt, Donald Maass and Janet Fitch, and read at the Iowa Summer Workshop. She has lived in Japan and India, but now resides in the Southern California foothills with her husband and the occasional deer.
She’s a member of SCBWI, SFWA, ITW, as well as one of the Apocalypsies, a group of 2012 debut YA and MG authors. In 2012 she joined Beth Revis and the talented gang of five 2011 and five 2012 debut YA dystopian and science fiction authors at The League of Extraordinary Writers.
Thank you for joining us on YABC today! First off, can you tell us a little bit about your latest novel, STARTERS?
Thanks so much for inviting me! STARTERS takes place in a future where desperate teens rent out their bodies to seniors called Enders so they can enjoy being young again. But one Ender plans to do more than just have fun, she plans to murder someone. It is my debut and came out on March 13. The book trailer showed before The Hunger Games movie in selected theaters both in the U.S. and the U.K.
Were there any television shows, films, songs, or books that helped fuel your creativity and inspiration while working on STARTERS?
I was very encouraged by the writing of Suzanne Collins because she didn't talk down to the reader—she just told her story. I also loved the UGLIES series by Scott Westerfeld for his amazing world building.
But the films of Christopher Nolan were my biggest influences. I love to play with different levels of reality, and have scenes where at least one character doesn't know who the other one really is.
Are there any STARTERS contests our readers should know about and enter?
Yes, always! If you go to www.LissaPrice.com I have a page that updates current contests. And many are announced on Twitter. Follow me at Lissa_Price there or LissaPriceAuthor on FB for the latest announcements.
Which books or authors have inspired your craft?
If Scott Westerfeld's
Uglies, James Dashner's
The Maze Runner, and Veronica Roth's
Divergent had a book baby, it would be
Starters. Telling the story of Callie, a girl living in the future where a virus killed every that had not been vaccinated, Callie has no parents and no grandparents to help her, so she is responsible for taking care of her little brother...living on the run, trying to survive.
To earn money and care for her brother, Callie does what she said she would never do. She allows Prime Destinations, a creepy corporation run by the Old Man, to rent her body to an elderly person. It pays well and she's assured nothing can go wrong. Well, we all know how that ends, right?
This plot MOVES. I turned pages like crazy, wanting to know what happened to Callie and her family. The characters are all well developed and though not necessarily unique in its dystopian genre, the drama is there and the story will leave you wanting more. Apparently, the 2nd and last book in the 2-book series comes out in December. Yay!
StartersLissa Price352 pagesYoung AdultDelacorte Press9780385742375March 2012Review copy
Lissa Price's Starters dropped on my doorstep yesterday. I disappeared. Maybe you saw me yesterday afternoon, but really? I was in a future version of southern California. I followed Callie Woodhill as she tried to "sell" her body to an elderly renter in the hopes of raising enough money to get medicine for her dangerously ill 7-year-old brother.
In this future world, many people between the ages of 25 and 75-ish were killed during the Spore Wars. Children and the elderly had been vaccinated and they survived. But lifespans have increased to upwards of 200 years so employing the young is against the law to insure that the Enders - as older people are called - can continue working. Children and teens, (Starters), who do not have older relatives to claim them become slaves to the state until they reach 19.
The chasm between the rich and employed and the unclaimed and poor is vast and ugly. Enter Prime Destinations, a company that exists under the law. Rich Enders, the really old ones, can rent the bodies of teens while the teens' brains are put to sleep. The Enders' bodies stay behind in a coma state. Callie takes a chance that Prime Destinations will keep their promises and agrees to three rentals, each one longer than the last.
So if I could give some advice here? RUN! Away! FAST! But then the story would be about surviving and possibly her brother's death and squalor, etc., etc. So Callie doesn't run. When she wakes up in her renter's clothes, she starts getting telepathic messages from her renter - who has dire plans for Callie's youthful body. Dire, dreadful, dangerous, desperate plans. The plans depend on Callie's extraordinary talents as a markswoman. Not good.
Another piece of advice for Callie - stay away from rich handsome Starters. I don't think she takes that advice either. Sigh.
Expensive cars and fashions, clubs, VIPS, lifestyles of the Rich and Ender-ly, cat and mouse chases, and nasty villains combine with the mystery of just who is behind Prime Destinations to create a page turner.
This is the first in a proposed series. I have some awful suspicions about who The Old Man - Prime Destinations' founder - is. Awful, cringe-making suspicions. So I am anxious for the next installment. Go, Callie, go. And stay away from that rich Starter! (Oh, I so hope I'm wrong.)
Even my 8th grade Picky Reader liked this one. I was super bummed that this book didn't come in the last order of the year! It will be wildly popular next year. Great book!