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I initially gave The 100 three stars, but after starting the TV show, I’ve realized how much better this book could have been. And it could have been 1000x better.

After a nuclear winter almost destroyed earth, what was left of the population had to turn to space to keep the human race alive. They are what they call the “colony�� and have been living in space for what has been three hundred years. But their home has begun break and fall apart, and so 100 criminals are sent on a desperate mission to earth to see if the planet is survivable.

That sounded interesting enough to read about to me. But what could have been a great sci-fi and dystopian novel was instead a mushy gushy novella-like tale with no shortage of drama. I was really expecting a survival story of the 100 fighting radioactive apes or zombies or SOMETHING when they reached earth, but nope, I found something else entirely.

One of the things that bothered me the most was the utter lack of world building. The amount of details and information not given was ridiculous. First of all, we are told no good reason as to why humans had to abandon earth. This is, for real, all we get:

As nuclear and biological war threatened to destroy Earth, space had been the only option for those lucky enough to survive the first stages of the cataclysm.

What war? What happened to earth?! Throughout the entire book, I kept waiting and waiting for some sort of explanation but I never got one and I’m still frustrated about that.

Second of all, the colony puts the 100 (young children and teenagers btw) on a rickety drop ship and shoots them in the general direction of what was once east coast USA. Besides only one month of total provisions, they are sent with nothing but bracelets that monitor its user’s vital signs. But that’s it. They send juvenile children to a desolate, possibly radiation soaked planet with no way to communicate with them and I just had to shake my head.

There are four main characters, each with their own POV: Clarke, Wells, Bellamy and Glass. They’ve each broken the law in some way or another and their crimes (besides Bellamy’s) are slowly revealed throughout the book by way of flashbacks.

Bellamy, the hot-headed rebel who always thinks he knows best was my favorite for sure.

Now she was being given a second chance at life. And Bellamy was going to make damn sure she got it. He didn’t care what he had to do. He was going to Earth with her.

He has a borderline manic urge to protect his sister, Octavia. But it’s actually one of the few things the book gets right. He is a part of the 100 by his own choice and would do anything and everything to protect her. But this strong bond between them was very believable after reading their background story, and I had to admire him.

But everyone else? These people who were given a chance at a new beginning? Yeah, they spend the book wrapped around their love lives.

Exhibit A:

Clarke rose with a groan, her muscles stiff from their hike yesterday. But it was a good kind of pain; she’d walked through a forest that hadn’t been seen by a single human being in three hundred years. Her stomach squirmed as she thought about another distinction she’d inadvertently earned-the first girl to kiss a boy on Earth since the Cataclysm.

Sigh. I was beginning to lose it.

I was the most disappointed with Glass. I found her storyline to be ENTIRELY pointless. Glass wasn’t a part of the 100, but actually remained within the colony. I saw a lot of potential there, but she was not utilized properly. I thought her character would be used for us to witness all the inner workings and politicking going on by the Chancellor and the rest of the colony’s government, but unfortunately, we don’t get any of that stuff. All her pages were filled with the drama between her and her boyfriend. It contributed nothing to the plot and I felt that it was an absolute waste of space.

After finishing this book, I was actually extremely wary about watching the show. While I found reading the book to be funny. It’s not something I would like to watch on tv. But the show totally wins. It’s sooooooo much better! It’s everything this book could have and should have been. It’s actually about survival, and while it does have some drama (it’s a CW show after all), it’s tells a great story about people having to war with their humanity in order to survive.



And blessedly, Glass�� character doesn’t even exist!

If you find the plot interesting, I recommend for you to just watch the show. But with that being said, this book wasn’t ALL bad. I was still entertained and others probably would be as well. I don’t know why, but I found all the angst and drama (though bizarre) to be very amusing for some reason and I had a great time snickering and shaking my head at the characters. I think I might actually want to read book 2 someday. When I’m REALLY bored.

2 �� 2.5 stars for Bellamy

P.S. Why on earth is Finn on the cover of this book? He's not in the book!

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I sort of really don't want to read this, but I would like to try out the show.

Crossing my fingers this won't be as cheesy as I fear it will be.
Here goes nothing!