What is it about?
SCAR ISLAND is about a group of juvenile delinquents attending a reformatory school on an Alcatraz-like island.
How is it structured?
SCAR ISLAND checks in at a relatively slim 249 pages. The story unfolds over 30 quickly paced chapters and the third person narrative focuses on Jonathan Grisby and his arrival and assimilation at Slabhenge Reformatory School for Troubled Boys. Interlaced occasionally between the chapters are letters Jonathan is forced to write home to his parents.
The story begins in a creepy way, as Jonathan arrives at Slabhenge by boat during the onset of a big storm. He is introduced to the villainous Admiral and his cast of grotesque adult minions and it is clear that Jonathan's extended stay at Slabhenge is going to be anything but pleasant. The plot quickly twists however, when a freak accident leaves all the adults on the island dead and the boys left on their own. There is some psychological intrigue as the boys wrestle with their longing to return home, and their desire for independence and freedom after being treated so horribly.
There are a few mysteries that string readers along, such as what is lurking behind The Hatch, a mysterious, century-old metal hatch buried deep in the tunnels beneath Slabhenge, and the reader is left in the dark about what Jonathan did to find himself in Slabhenge (although there is plenty of foreshadowing along the way).
What did I like?
The opening chapters of SCAR ISLAND are fantastic. Gemeinhart does a great job of pulling the reader into this very grim, atmospheric setting. He writes "a dark and stormy night" really, really well! It feels a little bit dated (we are never given a time period, the characters speak with thick, almost archaic accents, the Admiral carries a sword, and Slabhenge feels like a centuries-old castle) and I liked this obscure feeling.
Once we get to Slabhenge, Jonathan's arrival is filled with tension. The Admiral is so creepy that you naturally start fearing for Jonathan's well-being. He had the makings of a great villain. Likewise, Jonathan's first night in his cell is wrought with suspense.
I also liked the confusion among the boys once they were left alone on the island. Some boys wanted to stick around after being mistreated and experience some freedom and have some fun. However, others just wanted to go home. This confusion felt genuine and I was intrigued by the moral dilemma they found themselves in. There's a line where Sebastian and Jonathan are talking and Sebastian says, "You want to stay so you can be nothing. I want to stay so I can be something." I thought this was a great line and summed up their motivations.
What did I dislike?
Unfortunately, the wheels of the story come off when the adults die. In fact, I almost found myself wishing they hadn't and that Gemeinhart had a different story to tell. Sebastian's rise to power among the boys happened so quickly and I found myself highly doubting that any single boy in that situation, surrounded by so many like-minded boys, would be able to wield so much power so quickly. It did not feel genuine to me, the way the other boys just went along with everything Sebastian commanded. Especially when he starts to punish other boys publicly.
Likewise, I did not find myself connecting to Jonathan. This is the problem when you shroud so much of your protagonist's life in mystery. Readers will want to keep reading for the sake of getting to the bottom of the mystery, but there's not a lot of the character to grab onto. By the time we find out the truth about Jonathan, I found myself not caring much about him. Furthermore, we really don't find out much about any of the boys' pasts. We get tidbits from time to time but without any real glimpses into their past, it makes redemption impossible because we don't even know what they are redeeming themselves from! Being mistreated at Slabhenge for one chapter? I needed more...
Overall, I did not think the story was very exciting or suspenseful. At least, not as much as it was disguising itself to be. The boys acted so stupid, blindly following Sebastian as the hurricane approached, that I didn't really care if they made it out or not. I thought the Librarian character was just plain weird and given way too much page-time and I was disappointed when the mystery surrounding The Hatch turns out to be not much of a mystery after all. I had a difficult time picturing the facility. I also wanted more closure in the end than we are given.
Final verdict?
SOME KIND OF COURAGE by Dan Gemeinhart is one of my favorites in recent memory so my hopes for this one were high. It had all the makings of a HOLES-type book, but fell short of that because the characters (outside of Colin), just weren't very likable. I'm sure some students will find this very enthralling (Gemeinhart is a very good writer), but it just didn't work for me.
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