The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I'm not sure what I expected when I started The Adoration of Jenna Fox. Probably a love story. Definitely not a near-future story about a girl involved in a tragic accident who has been re-bioengineered by her parents. But the story is one many readers can identify with. Jenna struggles to remember something that happened in her past -- I'm sure many probably envy her the ability not to remember as we all probably have things we'd rather forget.  Jenna is struggling to figure out who she is -- we all went through/are going through figuring out who we are in terms of trying out different clothing styles, hobbies, hair, etc. What does it take to be your own person?

The novel raises questions about medical and scientific ethics that could turn out to be a real problem for the world in years to come. What if scientists bioengineer plants resistant to specific bugs, which lends other bugs useless because they don't need to defend the plants. One small change like that could be disastrous to an ecosystem.

I was surprised most of all by the ending. I expected Jenna to go to the mat for what her friend wanted, but that didn't happen. At least scientists made changes to the biogel so bioengineered people live a "normal" length of time?

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If you liked this title, you might also like:

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