House of the Scorpion

Book review for House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer. I rated it 4 stars. A sci-fi book set in the distant future where cloning technology has been invented. The book follows the story of a young boy named Matt, the clone of a rich drug lord named El Patron. The book is labelled as YA, which I’ll admit biased my opinion on it going in. Part of the reason for this label is because we follow Matt from ages 6 to 15, so it’s a bit of a coming of age story. Although it’s YA, the themes of the book are serious with the topic of clones and free will. Matt endures abuse and the isolation of not being recognised as a human being. We also see Matt make immature mistakes as he mistakenly models his behaviour on El Patron who he idolises. But in keeping with its YA label, the plot itself is less a philosophical question - of course Matt deserves to be recognised as a human being - and is partially a bit of an adventure story to cater to a young audience. I really enjoyed the world-building of…