The New Order (Young World, #2)

by Chris Weitz

They thought they were the only ones left. They were wrong.

After the unexpected revelation at the end of the first book, Donna and Jefferson are separated. Jefferson returns to NYC and tries to bring a cure to the Sickness back to the Washington Square tribe, while Donna finds herself in England, facing an unimaginable new world. Can the two reunite and prevent an even greater disaster than the Sickness?

This second book in The Young World trilogy will keep you at the edge of your seat.

• ISBN10: 1907411828
• ISBN13: 9781907411823
• Publish Date: 14 April 2016 (first published 16 June 2015)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
• Imprint: ATOM
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 320
• Language: English

Reviews

[Kelly]

In a world reminiscent of a brutal colony run by gangs, it's always been kill or be killed. A plague wiping out adults and children, leaving the teen population to inherit a now broken New York. Segregation runs rife, gangs are challenged for their supplies, weapons and space. In The New Order, our young group of protagonists have been rescued from the island with a possible cure and now find themselves on board a Navy vessel, still unaware to the state of the rest of the world.

As the storyline progresses, the readers learn more about the new world through multiple points of view. Luckily each point of view has a unique voice and spans across the globe, especially Donna and Jefferson. Jefferson is working with the Patriots who have an agenda of their own beyond saving the New York teen population, while Donna is sent to Cambridge and begins to migrate into college life. New friends, exploring her surroundings while having the occasional drink with her new friend in Rab. In The Young World, I found Donna's character likable but in the latest series installment she's incredibly annoying.

"Who in the what, now?"
"Say what?"
"Within the what?"
"Tutor? Am I, like, that dumb?"

With her new Valley Girl persona, Donna's new surroundings seem to have little purpose to the actual storyline overall. Luckily those chapters are offset by Jefferson, who I enjoy much more as a character despite being incredibly straight laced and wise beyond his years. I would have loved to have heard more from Peter's character, who for me made The Young World much more enjoyable.

Overall, I did enjoy The New Order but the series may have benefited from being a duology as much of the content felt unnecessary. It was Jefferson's point of view that intrigued me most and the only progression within the storyline. The pop culture references were few and far between, but I still feel as though the storyline is clinical and a little too cliche. It needs more emotion to be able to invest in it's characters and their plight. Looking forward to the series finale, but still with some reservations.

[Angie]

The New Order is another victim of Middle Book Syndrome. I was definitely onto something with my questions involving the first book, because that’s what most of the this sequel focuses on. Well, kind of. The helicopter picks up Jefferson and Co., quarantines them, and then only kind of answers their questions after asking their own. Sadly, most of the answers are super disappointing, and then the characters go about doing stuff before an abrupt end.

What I really wanted to know was, what happened to the rest of the world? The New Order tells us and the answer can be summed up in one word: nothing. Somehow other countries stopped the Sickness from spreading and they’ve just gone about life mostly as normal. Obviously, with American gone world trade is much different and there’s tensions, but overall, the rest of the world is somehow fine. I honestly don’t believe that based on how quickly the Sickness was said to spread through America. I find it highly unlikely that the people traveling while carrying it, somehow didn’t infect others.

The New Order finds our narrators split up. Donna is taken to the U.K. and her chapters are super boring. She doesn’t do anything interesting except think about Jefferson because she thinks he’s dead. There’s really nothing happening there. Meanwhile, everyone else is back in New York and trying to figure out how to approach distributing the cure. Obviously, Jefferson wants to save everyone, but he also knows that everyone knowing they’re going to live is going to change things. Everyone has been living under the assumption that nothing matters and they’re all going to die within a couple years, so who cares? Now they have to care. I did find Jefferson’s chapters interesting because of this. These teens have to essentially rebuild a function society now instead of fighting each other for supplies.

The New Order also adds a few new POVs, and they all annoyed me. None of them really added much in terms of the plot, that was all left to Jefferson. I like Peter but his chapters felt kind of stereotypical. Brainbox’s chapters are literally giant run on sentences and were very hard to follow, so I didn’t bother. Then *beep*’s chapters are just annoying. There were times I just wanted to yell “Okay, you can shut up now!”

I definitely would have liked The New Order more without the three extra perspectives. Donna’s chapters may not have engaged me, but at least we learn some new stuff from her.

Read more of my reviews at Pinkindle Reads & Reviews.