Author: Andrew Klavan
Genre: Contemporary, Adventure, Thriller
Recommended Age: 15+
Summary: Charlie West was just a normal American high schooler until the day he woke up in a terrorist’s torture chamber with no memory of the last year of his life. And when he learns that he’s been convicted as a murderer and the police are hunting him, remembering what happened in the missing year becomes integral to stopping a terrorist invasion on America.
Notes from The Radical Reader:
- Noble Characters: America is under attack by terrorists. And Charlie’s the only one who may remember how to take them down. A trained black belt, he’s spent his whole life as a staunchly proud American. But when he wakes up hunted by both the police and the terrorists, Charlie has to figure out the truth before America crumbles.
- Captivating Plots: The terrorists want him dead. The police say he’s an escaped prisoner, convicted of the murder of his best friend. With a year of his life gone, unsure of who his allies are, and hunted by both sides, Charlie’s only hope is finding someone who can make sense of what happened to his memory before America falls to a crippling terrorist attack.
- Elaborate Worlds: This contemporary adventure story starts in an average American town and soon spreads to America at large. Written from the perspective of eighteen-year-old Charlie West, The Homelanders series will captivate readers who love adventure, high stakes, characters loyal to their countries, and heroes who won’t give up no matter what.
Noteworthy Elements:
- Violence: There is a reference to a man being tortured by the terrorists before being killed. Charlie meets a terrorist who he describes as “He liked to torture people and kill them slowly and then send the videos to their families”. Charlie describes one of the inmates in prison as “Not a nice guy. He was in here for murder. He’d beaten a man to death in a bar, just punched him in the head until he stopped breathing”. Charlie’s girlfriend is threatened by terrorists who break into her house. Charlie is tortured by the terrorists (off-screen) and he is threatened with torture at different spots in the story. No other explicit details are given.
- Sexual Tension: A guy calls himself hot and Charlie tells his girlfriend “I was kind of hoping [you love me] cause I’m just so incredibly hot”. When Charlie is saying goodbye to his friends, he tells them, “Stay on the Web. I’m gonna turn up on your computer more often than a second-rate starlet” to which Charlie’s friend replies, “Only keep your underwear on, all right? I have a weak stomach”. A woman is attacked on the street, described as “The man had the woman pinned there, one hand on her throat, the other moving roughly over her body”.
- Profanity: “Gee” is used a handful of times. “My God” is used twice and the phrase “are you out of your ever-loving mind” is used once. During a fight in the prison, Charlie comments “This is hell. It must look just like this in hell”. Charlie describes his dad’s prayers as sending a father’s blessings “into the bowels of this hell” and Charlie refers to the prison as hell.
- Spiritual: There is a reference to a martial arts class kneeling in a meditation position.
- Other: The phrases “why don’t you tell me what’s biting your butt” and “kick your butt” are each used once. When Charlie is sick, he wakes up “wearing nothing but my boxer shorts and T-shirt”. After being injected with a medicine to heal his memories, Charlie wakes up and realizes he is “wearing nothing but underwear”. No other explicit details are given. One of Charlie’s friends teases that lunch hour at school is where guys “gaze stupidly into our girlfriend’s eyes while little heart-shaped bubbles come blipping out of our ears and nostrils”. Later, another friend teases Charlie that he can’t “get within ten feet of a girl without melting into a pile of quivering mucus”.
