The Final Warning

My review for the first book of this series still stands. I suppose I only kept reading after that point out of pure bile fascination, or out of some futile hope that the books would get better and that the plot might in fact go somewhere. I really wanted these books to be good. The original premise sounded good. Winged kids who fight evil overarching entities? Come on, that's cool. Or at least it would be if that was actually what went on, instead of what does happen in this series, which is close to nothing.

This book was where the series well and truly jumped the shark, and where I finally stopped reading. It dropped what plot it had left, turned all its characters into Sues (though they were already heading in that direction anyway), show more and turned into a thinly disguised tract against global warming. I agree with the author on this issue. That doesn't mean I want to be lectured to death on it. If I wanted that, I'd read blog posts on the issue. I DO read blog posts on the issue. In a work of fiction, I expect any such views to be handled with a little more grace and artistry, because literature is supposed to be an art form. If you make it nothing more than your own soapbox, people will not read it, they will not enjoy it, and ultimately it will succumb to the next hot-button issue. The Grapes of Wrath and A Christmas Carol give social commentary. But people have read them, and still read them, because they're good literature, and not propaganda. Learn the difference, James Patterson. show less

http://yearningtoread.blogspot.com/

The Flock has just said goodbye to Ari, Max's half brother...the one who tried to kill them all in the past, but changed his ways and got killed. Now the Flock has to move on without him. They're all developing new, crazy powers on their own, all getting stronger and ready to take on the world. When Mrs. Martinez, Ella and Max's mom, recommends the Flock to a team headed toward Antarctica, the Flock are hoping to use their new skills to help save the world. But what is this new mission in this freezing cold place? Will they be safe like the scientists claim?
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My thoughts -
Once again, these books are great. I loved the action and the connection between show more characters, as well as the outstanding scenery. But there are two things I didn't love...or even like.
1. The new bad guys.
2. The sudden, cheese-ball homage to global warming. BAM! Out of nowhere? Maybe if the series had led up to this, it would've made more sense.

Character notes -
I'll start with the bad guys. Ok...what? Where did THAT come from? It was strange. And choppy. And just plain weird. I wanted to to snort in disbelief. Definitely cheesy...not the cheesy I love about the Flock, but "Are you freaking kidding me?!" cheesy.

However, despite the stupidity of James Patterson's newest destroy-the-world freaks, the good guys were great. Max continues to be amazing, along with the rest of the Flock. The crew of the ship was a great addition, especially Brigid. She caused tension between Max...and FANG!

Ok, so Fang grows up a little bit with each book. It's seriously super attractive. Like, him lacing up his manly snow boots while giving Max this business...or uncoiling rope to save someone's life. Or the way he works so well with Max. He's becoming a man and it's extremely appealing and worthy of the butterflies that float around inside of me whenever I read or hear his name.

Story notes -
Like I sad. Global warming. Outta nowhere. Like the bad guys or the weird random hurricane at the end. There wasn't enough intro to it, any of it. Maybe if the last book had somehow led up to it, I would have found it enjoyable. But as far as I know, this is a one-book thing. Which kind of irked me.

Besides that, I liked the story. The new setting of Antarctica, complete with blinding snow and penguins, was really fascinating and held my interest. It was a great way to add originality to the series. The fight scenes and rescue scenes were good, written well. And, my favorite, the romance. It's blossoming, another reason why I love Fang and how stinking manly he is.

Summing it up -
A cool ride. Like, if Disney gave the Matterhorn real snow and some penguins to waddling about, and maybe a few bird kids to fly around it, that's what it'd be like. Despite the random holes and sudden appearances in the story, I was highly entertained and am looking forward to book #5, Max.
Extremely clean, nothing for the parents. show less

I enjoyed the series quite a bit until this entry. The author basically abducted this series to write about global warming awareness. It's so blatant it hurts. Are you telling me that all this time Max was supposed to save the world by talking about global warming before the audience, Greta Thunberg style? Yeah, right... And that was just the cherry on top of this disaster.

It's nice to be passionate about the good of the world, but changing the story of the series to fit the agenda is just going to leave the fans mad. You could have always written a new story or made this an optional side story novella...

I am not continuing with the series as from sequels reviews I learned there are some more questionable things happening further on. I show more will rather keep the good memory of the first three books and pretend that the story ended there. show less

WHAT?! I really liked the first 3 books, but when I got to this one I got so confused. It feels like James Patterson suddenly got interested in Antarctica and penguins. I mean, all throughout the series, NO ONE MENTIONED GLOBAL WARMING!!!! I mean seriously, I think some organization paid Patterson to encourage people to save the environment, but it makes no sense. The only good things are Max/Fang love relationship, Nudge's new powers, and that Iggy can sometimes see. The rest was crap. I thought about skipping the book since the "villains" didn't even survive because Max let them die in a HURRICANE, I mean she always said she was not a murderer (except for Ari) but she pretty much let the guy die. Oh and I thought, "Why keep an 80 show more pound dog, even though the flock always flies and has to carry her?" Just because Total fell in love with a dog that can't talk back to him and doesn't love him, doesn't mean it's worth it. I felt like, "Shame on you Mr. Patterson, this doesn't even compare to the first 3, so why publish it?" I just hope the other books are better than this God forsaken one. show less

My problem with the story wasn't so much that James Patterson used it as a soapbox for global warming -- after all, it's his book, and he can do what he wants.

The problem, as I see it, is there was NO WAY he started writing this series with a plan to make Max's "saving the world mission" one that had anything to do with this topic.

If you go back and read the series from the beginning, starting with THE ANGEL EXPERIMENT, we all knew that Max and the gang had a special mission, a mission that would save the world. We knew it would be big, and no doubt unbelievable, as most of Mr. Patterson's plot lines are. But if this had been his plan all along, you have to think that there would have been SOME advance warning.

No, what really ticks me show more off is that it seems as if he decided, with the current state of affairs, to change the whole point of the books at the very last minute, as a way to promote his cause.

THAT'S what makes me angry.

(The only good thing about THE FINAL WARNING? Total's "I prefer canine-American" comment, which made me laugh until I cried.) show less

After reading this book, I began to wonder if Patterson actually had a full plotline in mind when he first started writing the series.

The Uber-Director was set up as Mr Big And Menacing, but all he did was turn out to be a limbless flop. What happened to the New Age and Itex and taking over the world? If the American government knew about the School, why the heck didn't they do anything about it? Hello? We went from "I'm going to rule the world by creating the population of the New Age" to "Let's all be happy and recycle!" Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against going green, but Patterson pulled up his Al Gore soapbox at the worst time possible. The fourth book had potential up until, say, about page eighty.

Patterson left so many show more strings dangling in this book that we were hardly any wiser than we'd been at the end of the third installment. We never knew what the whole Voice-thing was about, Itex is still at full force, the School is still operating, and there's probably another successor to follow in the Uber-Director's... wheelchair tracks.

All in all, this book was a serious disappointment. I read the ending twice. In a row. Because I thought I'd missed something. But no, that was it. Horrible, Patterson. Just horrible. How could you? show less

Posted in September 2008:

Maximum Ride, what can I say about you? I loved the first book in this series, and while I never tire of Max and her flock of bird kids (the books follow a group of kids who were genetically modified to carry bird DNA, and they have wings and some other abilities), I feel Patterson has kind of lost his way with these novels. I love the smart-ass banter among the kids and their individual personalities, and I love Max's combination of toughness, sarcasm, and vulnerability, but the plots have really gone downhill. In the first book (and the second to some extent), there was a whole "save the world, find out who we are, escape from the evil scientists" story, but now these elements have branched out all over and show more don't feel cohesive anymore. Like, the series as a whole -- the overarching storyline -- has stopped making sense. Also, this one was really short and was so overt about its environmental message that even I felt annoyed, and I'm all for authors sneaking in such messages. But I still love the characters, so I'll keep reading as these books keep coming out, just to see what happens to them. show less