Maximum Ride: The Fugitives

The Angel Experiment, School’s Out - Forever, Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

A quiet fourteen year old boy, a blind one, an eleven year old motor mouth girl, an eight year old fart kid, his six year old angelic sister, and a fourteen year old girl leading them. Sounds like a great story? Not so much right? Oh, I forgot, they have wings and they can fly.

Synopsis:

So it’s about the group of genetically modified human avian hybrid kids, mostly from the point of view of Max, their leader. They escaped from their laboratory with the help of their father figure, Jeb, who disappeared two years ago, leaving the flock on their own.

The story begins when the Erasers, human and wolf hybrids, kidnaps Angel, the youngest of the flock. They know that she would be taken back to the “School,” the laboratory in California where inhumane experiments were done to them. So the rescue began. Along the way, they split up, got bloody encounters with the Erasers, got back together and got caught, before they could rescue Angel and escape as a whole. And this is just the beginning.

As the flock discovers some of their hidden mutant powers, Max begins hearing a voice in her head, telling her that she is to save the world. This “Voice” acts more like an annoyance than a guide, but the flock ends up following its advice and directions since it actually act as an ally. All along, Erasers, including Jeb’s son, Ari, keep popping up here and there to make things complicated, each time as a new and improved version.

Max has troubles of her own; as a number of people, clues, and secrets pointed out that she is supposed to save the world. The thing is, she doesn’t have a clue how, why, and from what.

The Flock as illustrated by Nara Lee in the graphic novels

Review:

The thing is that they are kids who can fly. They are free to do what they want, but they must also survive on their own. The whole experience of reading their story through their point of view is fun and exhilarating. Of course, flying kids travel a lot. In these three books, they watched a concert in New York, rode the Disney World’s Splash Mountain in Florida, and even spend some time in the restaurants of Paris, France.

This trilogy is very fast paced. One moment everything was nice, then the next they’re fighting for their lives. I think the title fits the story. You really feel that they were fugitives. They were always on the move, always alert, as if in any moment the Erasers could attack. And they did.

The books are divided into small chapters. It’s a smart way of writing I think. The story was just too riveting that it makes its readers want to read more but the small chapters somehow manages to slow the pace down just a bit by giving the readers some breathing room.

All in all, the trilogy is really great. However, the story doesn’t really have an ending until the third book. The first two doesn’t really provide some closure of any sort. After this trilogy, three more books were already published, and the seventh and series ender book will be out on February next year.