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Title details for The Cityborn by Edward Willett - Available

The Cityborn

by Edward Willett
ebook
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Two young individuals must uncover the dark secrets of their stratified city in this suspenseful sci-fi standalone
The metal City towers at the center of the mountain-ringed Heartland, standing astride the deep chasm of the Canyon like a malevolent giant, ruled with an iron fist by the First Officer and his Provosts in the name of the semi-mythical Captain. Within its corroding walls lies a stratified society, where the Officers dwell in luxury on the Twelfth Tier while the poor struggle to survive on the First and Second, and outcasts scrabble and fight for whatever they can find in the Middens, the City’s rubbish heap, filling the Canyon beneath its dripping underbelly.
Alania, ward of an Officer, lives on Twelfth. Raised among the privileged class, Alania feels as though she is some sort of pampered prisoner, never permitted to explore the many levels of the City. And certainly not allowed to leave the confines of the City for any reason. She has everything a young woman could want except a loving family and personal freedom.
Danyl, raised by a scavenger, knows no home but the Middens. His day-to-day responsibility is to stay alive. His sole ambition is to escape from this subsistence existence and gain entrance to the City—so near and yet so far out of reach—in hopes of a better life.
Their two very different worlds collide when Alania, fleeing from an unexpected ambush, plunges from the heights of the City down to the Middens, and into Danyl’s life.
Almost immediately, both of them find themselves pursued by the First Officer’s Provosts, for reasons they cannot fathom—but which they must uncover if they are to survive. The secrets they unlock, as they flee the Canyon and crisscross the Heartland from the City’s farmlands to the mountains of the north and back again, will determine not only their fate, but the fate of the City…and everyone who lives there.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    July 4, 2017

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9780756412890
      • File size: 1135 KB

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9780756412890
      • File size: 1007 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      May 29, 2017
      Willett (the Helix War series) wraps his capable new adult science fiction adventure around the fate of a mysterious many-tiered city and its inhabitants. The Captain, the only person who can access the city’s repair systems, is dying, and First Officer Kranz and his allies bred a handful of special children, the Cityborn, to replace him—but all but one of the Cityborn have died. Alania, Kranz’s ward, is thought to be the only surviving Cityborn. When a surprise rebel attack sends Alania down a trash chute to escape, she ends up many tiers down in the Middens and encounters Danyl, another Cityborn who was raised in secret. With rival forces hunting them, the two must fight to survive and decide for themselves which side they’re on. Readers will probably work out the city’s secret long before it’s formally revealed, but Willett’s spunky protagonists and colorful world will entertain SF adventure fans. Agent: Ethan Ellenberg, Ethan Ellenberg Literary.

    • Library Journal

      June 15, 2017

      Twenty years ago, a special mission sent a resistance agent to the highest levels of the City to steal an important child named Danyl. Raised in the middens, the garbage heaps that skirt the bottom of the towering self-contained city, he scavenges for the funds that will earn him a pass to enter the City itself, even if he can reach only the lowest tiers steeped in poverty and oppression. Alania, who was missing from the nursery the night Danyl was kidnapped, was fostered by an officer and grew up as a member of the privileged class on the Twelfth Tier. She and Danyl are both potential catalysts for reviving the City, and when their paths intersect, they will have to decide whose vision of the City's future they will follow. VERDICT The rigid dystopian society of the City is nothing new, but the young protagonists give this latest novel from Willett ("The Shards of Excalibur" series) possible appeal for teen readers. Unfortunately, the plot loses a little coherence as it races to a muddled conclusion.--MM

      Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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