Title: Proxy
Author: Alex London
Genre: Sci-Fi
Book Blurb:
Knox was born into one of the City’s wealthiest families. A Patron, he has everything a boy could possibly want—the latest tech, the coolest clothes, and a Proxy to take all his punishments. When Knox breaks a vase, Syd is beaten. When Knox plays a practical joke, Syd is forced to haul rocks. And when Knox crashes a car, killing one of his friends, Syd is branded and sentenced to death.
Syd is a Proxy. His life is not his own.
Then again, neither is Knox’s. Knox and Syd have more in common than either would guess. So when Knox and Syd realize that the only way to beat the system is to save each other, they flee. Yet Knox’s father is no ordinary Patron, and Syd is no ordinary Proxy. The ensuing cross-country chase will uncover a secret society of rebels, test both boys’ resolve, and shine a blinding light onto a world of those who owe and those who pay. Some debts, it turns out, cannot be repaid.
Review:
When I first read the description of this book on Amazon, my first thought was This whole proxy/patron scenario sounds like The Whipping Boy (another book I read in middle school.) And indeed, the whole proxy-patron relationship is virtually identical; the only difference is that Proxy takes place in the future.
The action...it was a helluva of a ride! It was quite litereally nonstop action from page one till the very end (more about the end later because that ending requires a whole paragraph to itself.) So yeah, basically the entire book was like an intense roller coaster.
The world building was simply I-N-C-R-E-D-I-B-L-E. All those flashy, high tech gadgets really stretched my imagination, but are still totally plausible at the same time. And I loved the idea of integrating computer code into human DNA. All the citizens have computer codes running through their bloodstream, a constant stream of data flowing through them. I personally just find that idea mind boggling. I also loved how it is possible for someone to write out a computer code and then inject it into themselves and *bam* that person could start glowing in the dark, change eye color, etc, depending on what was written in the computer code.
