Rating: 3/5
Genre: Middle Grade Sci-Fi
Length: 216 pages
Published: 12th October 2023
In a country beset by civil war, New London defends itself behind a giant wall. Inside the city, children are forced to work from an early age, except for the lucky few who train to be leaders in the re-purposed Palace of Westminster. 12-year-old orphaned Pax is brilliant at recycling old tech. He enjoys working on the verti-farms and just wants a bit of peace and quiet. But when that is taken away from him, his only hope is to pass a near-impossible exam and join the other students in Scholastic Parliament. There he’ll make new friends and new enemies. He’ll get tested like never before. And he’ll discover that not everything is quite what it seems under the mayor’s harsh leadership.
This was an enjoyable dystopian, sci-fi middle grade read, set in a New London with robots, drones and AI, where aging populations are sent out of the walled off London, at the age of 60 along with the rest of the rich and the old. It isn’t made clear what has caused this divide of old and young, but New London is protected by a giant wall (think Divergent!) in an attempt to keep the outcast groups out of New London.
I always enjoy a school setting in a book, with our main character Pax, a seedling born to be a worker, joins in an attempt to escape Hairy Hanson and roles including the sewer cleaning, in the hopes that he might become an engineer one day. The four school groups, the competitions and the friendships/bullies made this book interesting to follow, cheering for the Judges who attempt to beat the odds and win the yearly competition, whilst relating to Pax’s experiences, especially with being in a new environment and the torment he receives for being unlike the others. But not all is as it seems. I loved the little robots and trinkets that Pax makes over the course of the book. They had their own personalities, which was a bit of a bonus in this book.
1984 is one of my favourite all time books, and I definitely felt like there was a 1984 feel to Pax and the Missing Head. We had security cameras and a supercomputer who monitored all movements and reported back, a control of the information being disseminated to those at the school, and a phrase that was constantly used (in 1984 this was “Big Brother is Watching You”, and in Pax, this was “New London is no place for losers” “We Will Win”)
I wish we were told more about the civil war aspect and what was the catalyst in the wall formation and people being kicked out of New London. There are a lot of unanswered questions and incomplete plot points. However I believe this is book 1, so hopefully these get discussed more in the next!
This book was a nice and easy to follow read and it was refreshing to read a middle grade dystopian book set in a familiar sort of setting, being a Londoner myself, but with a surprisingly bleak futuristic society.
I attended the Faber Academy in 2014 and from that had three climate-fiction thrillers published (The Gold Trilogy, Bloodhound Books). I joined SCBWI in 2018 as I shifted my focus to a younger audience. My MG debut, Pax & The Missing Head publishes with Tiny Tree in late 2023. I live in Berkshire with my wife and daughter. I have a passion for stories, sport and boardgames.
The Pen Not The Sword 