Sarah Govett

3.5 stars
School exams are stressful and can change your life but none are as stressful or life-changing as the ones 15-year-old teenagers have to undergo in Sarah Govett's The Territory.
It's the year 2059 and the water levels are rising causing a severe lack of land to live in and, therefore, making people who don't pass the exam to be sentenced to live in the Wetlands (a dangerous place filled with deadly diseases and no medical facilities), and not able to return to safety because of the high electric fences surrounding it.
Noa Blake is one of the many teens taking the exam and, in this first book, we see how she deals with everything (friends, family, boys and the crazy amount of studying). However, to make things worse and more unfair, the richest kids can have a surgical implant that allows them to 'download' information into their brains without having to study.
The Territory is a great book in the way that it criticises the educational system because even now the richest families can afford to enrol their children in better schools and have tutors while the less rich are obligated to accept the conditions their schools have. It also raises awareness for climate change and global warming, issues that are of utmost importance today.
The author created a very rich world and plot and I can't wait for the sequel!


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