Center for Teaching & Learning

When sixteen-year-old Dean ran out the door to catch the bus this morning, he never thought about stopping to say goodbye. Now, he wishes he had more than ever. On Tuesday, September 17th, 2024, the day begins with a hailstorm. Huge ice chunks send two school buses swerving into the parking lot of their local Greenway Superstore. The fourteen surviving students—the Monument 14—take shelter inside the store until further notice. In the days to follow, a volcanic eruption, a mega-tsunami, an earthquake, and a chemical spill are just a few of the disasters that plague the country. All the Monument 14 can do is sit and watch from the safety of the store. Will the Monument 14 make it out alive?

Monument 14 is a young adult novel by Emmy Laybourne that follows Dean Grieber, a High School Junior in Monument, Colorado, as he documents his experiences being trapped in a superstore with five other high schoolers, two eighth graders, and six elementary school students. This book will interest science fiction and romance fans alike with its thrilling, realistic storyline taking place in the near future. The fast-paced nature of this book will bring readers in and keep them locked in to the action. The end is enough to make anyone run to the shelves to continue the adventure—the sequels to this book, Sky on Fire and Savage Drift, both carry just as much action and suspense as the start of the trilogy.

I was immediately hooked on this story from the first page. As a lover of epistolary and log entry-style novels, this was an excellent book for me. The immersiveness of these types of books makes me feel like I’m a part of the action. I was drawn into the story by the suspenseful start and was kept in by the sudden surprises in every chapter. The point of view alternates from one character to the next, which also helped make the story interesting throughout. Each older student is based on a highschool archetype: the jock, the pretty girl, the outcast, the nerd, the popular class president. This gives the reader the illusion of realistic people having genuine interactions. It also gives the story a realistic feeling, even though it is an apocalyptic and, at times, improbable story setting.

I rated this book 9/10 and would recommend it to anyone ages 12-19 who is a lover of science fiction, dystopian fiction, realistic fiction, or romance. Readers will never forget this thrilling, immersive narrative and all the excitement it entails. Monument 14 is so much more than a book about some kids in a store. It is a dramatic survival story about love and friendship, even when the world as we know it is gone forever.

Josephine

Feiwel and Friends, 352 pages