The Final Warning (Maximum Ride, Book 4)

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Editorial Reviews:

Product Description
A breathtaking new story from the astonishing imagination of James Patterson: a girl who can fly has to save herself from the scientists who want to control her--and maybe save the world in the process.

Customer Reviews: Read 119 more reviews...

2 out of 5 stars

Condescending... March 18, 2008
128 out of 140 found this review helpful

I've read all of James Patterson's other Maximum Rides books and I loved them, they are clearly meant for teenagers without the effort you see other acclaimed writers make to make something appeal to children. Throughout those other novels, I had never really noticed that it had subtle things he thought would appeal to children, the children against the adults concept and so on...

So I really loved his past books and faithfully 'clicked' for the new Maximum Ride book over and over. Now that it's out I find it condescending and he seems to think that teenagers have no intelligence. James Patterson tries to blatantly sell the concept of global warming to his readers, which I understand at 14 I'm rather more well-versed in politics and important issues than other readers, but his writing about it made it seem like he was writing to a little five year old. Much of the book was him blatantly expressing the effects of global warming, and very little of the nail-biting action I've come to expect of this series.

I have absolutely no issue with authors trying to express their opinions through their books, however, when it's done as blatantly and boringly as this is it seems as if it's like an insult to my intelligence. Am I not supposed to notice that this book is basically him trying to sell the concept of global warming to the more impressionable readers? It wouldn't have been bad if he had bothered to be subtle, sort of like the Golden Compass by Philip Pullman (still getting off his controversial ideas to the younger set, yet leaving the chance for ignorance of the underlying themes there), but instead he chose to spend half the (small) book lecturing the reader on Global Warming by Max's sarcastic (for the most part) narration of it.

The beginning of the book was promising, with less adventure than usual but still interesting. Some slightly random events happened that were never fully explained (for those of you who read the book the green wire incident), but on the whole interesting and I was ready for the huge climax and the fun battles or whatever... Yeah not so much . .. By the end I felt like I had read a book meant for a five year old, like all of those little picture books with a moral or point (like telling the story of Hurricane Katrina). Even the 'Bad Guys' were more like something you would come to expect from a show like 'The Replacements' on Disney Channel than something supposedly meant for teenagers.

And the most annoying thing is, he would never have done this in one of his adult series. Anyways, I'm really let-down by how condescending the book seemed after all the excitement and I really hope he'll release a new one next year that mirrors the excitement and suspense of his earlier three books.

3 out of 5 stars

Just Okay March 17, 2008
33 out of 37 found this review helpful

I expected a lot more from the next chapter in the Maximum Ride saga. After all, the first three books were all about heart-pounding action, excellent character development, and just the right amount of romance to keep it interesting. Now take all of the first three books and squash them together into a single miniature version without any of the action, and you have The Final Warning. Granted, there are some good points, not to spoil any, but most of them happen towards the beginning of the novel. The last three quarters were, in my opinion, mainly rehashed storylines from the first three books. The action is only seen from the point of view of two characters including Max and Fang's meaningless 'book blog', not the actual blog that exists on the Web. Then there's the fact that the series has become a huge environmental tree-hugging plug as well. Yeah, we know the environment needs to be saved, but you don't have to beat it into our brains by making Max Ride the Eco-Lady of Popular Literature. Is this book what we Maximum Ride fans clicked a million times for? I think not. This one needs a sequel, if the Flock is to be saved.

2 out of 5 stars

Major Letdown April 4, 2008
23 out of 24 found this review helpful

The release of a sequel is an anticipated event, especially if the sequel is written by a wildly-popular, best-selling author like James Patterson. Approximately 4.8 million copies have been sold of the previous three books in the Maximum Ride series, so hopes were high that Final Warning, the new installment, would be just as entertaining. When a sequel fails to live up to the standards of the previous books in the series, readers feel let down.

There are three issues that affect the quality of Final Warning. First, there is a lack of adventure in this installment of the action-packed Maximum Ride adventure series. It seemed to be more of an extended brainstorming session instead of actual problem-solving. Second, the length of this book is an issue. For a novel that has a retail price of $20, 272 pages is pretty skimpy -- especially when you consider that The Angel Experiment, the first book in the series, had 432 pages. Finally, and most importantly, is the story itself. If the story had been interesting and new, the reader would be able to overlook the page length. Instead of adding anything new to the story, Patterson chose to focus on the issue of global warming and have The Flock, the six bird kids we've come to love, assist with scientific research in Antarctica. Final Warning appears to be more of a filler book than a necessary part of the series. In fact, if a reader were to skip Final Warning, there probably wouldn't be a problem catching up when a fifth book is published.

Instead of a character-driven storyline, Patterson has given us an extended public service announcement on global warming, and while global warming is a serious issue we need to think about, a young adult adventure novel might not be the best place to hammer the issue home.

1 out of 5 stars

GLOBAL WARMING!!! March 19, 2008
17 out of 20 found this review helpful

Okay, The first three books were some of the best books I've ever read, but this fourth one was...well...not as great. It was preachy and overly consumed with a political message to save the environment, in particular global warming. I'm all for recycling, and as the author repeatedly says, "saving the world," but why, why, why would James Patterson completely destroy one of the best book series. I think its a power problem, he got the attention of millions of readers, then he started preaching about Global Warming! One more thing, I was very, very sad when I was done with the third book. When the fourth book came out, I was sooooo happy! Then I read the book. I'm not so happy now. Mr. Patterson, I hope you do better in the fifth book, because I am very disapointed.

1 out of 5 stars

Don't Waste Your Money March 20, 2008
17 out of 20 found this review helpful

I started reading the Maximum Ride series after reading When the Wind Blows and the Lake House, Pattersons adult books with Max, and found the first three books in this series to be even better than the original adult books.

Naturally I was extremely excited when I heard that Patterson had decided to write a fourth book in the series and eagerly looked forward to more of the heart-pounding, read-all-night-until-your-finished action that I gleefully lapped up in the first three installments. The day The Final Warning came out I went to the bookstore first thing paid my twenty dollars and rushed home to read it. This book weighs in at a pathetic 256 pages, half of which is spent waxing on about the dangers of global warming and how it's all our fault.

As for the rest of the book, you know that whole Plot thing that most readers generally expect from a novel...well let me put it this way: Max and the Flock get kidnapped (again) and then escape, through absolutely no effort on their part (that's right Max doesn't out smart the bad guys or out fight them. Instead they're saved by a convienent something that rhymes with lurricane, not to give anything away, which was caused by global warming). Then Max gives a rousing speech to Congress about the dangers of global warming.

Sorry did I ruin the ending? At least now you can keep those twenty bucks and use them to buy gasoline and then send the receipt to James Patterson. Not that I'm bitter or anything.

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