Reading Response #1: Dust & Decay

             Dust & Decay is set in a world where zombies run rampant. The main character is Benny Imura. He receives bounty hunter training from his older brother Tom Imura. Tom also trains Nix, Chong, and Morgie. In the last book, Benny and Nix come across Lilah, a girl who has been alone most of her life and hunted to survive.  While out in the great Rot and Ruin (or the outside of the settlement in Mountainside), a great jumbo jet circles the sky. The jet could mean civilization. Nix, Benny, Tom, and Lilah decide to track the jet and see where it came from. For the first stretch of their journey, Chong decides to join them, mostly because he has a crush on Lilah and wanted to go with her. This review is going to focus on Chong.

Mountainside

            The group experiences trouble at the start of their journey. They run into a white rhinoceros. The rhinoceros is territorial and charges at them. Chong panics and makes their escape more difficult. Lilah's view of him is low because of that. She thinks that he is not cut out for the Rot and Ruin and tells him so.  Chong feels weak and inadequate. He feels guilty about the trouble he caused so he runs away.

            When he is on the run, two bounty hunters find him. He tries to fight them, but they are more skilled than him and knock him out. When he comes to, he is greeted by the great White Bear. White bear takes Chong to Gameland so he can be thrown into a pit and forced to fight against zombies. When Chong is first thrown into the pit, he reflects on his past moments.

Zombie Pit

                        “While he knelt there, his mind did terrible things to him. It conjured images of Lilah standing over him, watching him kneel in sobbing defeat, and laughing. Laughing at the weak, skinny kid. At the “town boy” who thought he could be a warrior. At the fool who dared to think that he could ever in a million years win the love of someone as magical and powerful as the legendary Lost Girl. At the loser who had endangered the lives of his friends. At the coward who had run away. The images and the implications were like nails driven into his flesh. But sometimes shame is a more powerful engine than rage.”(pg. 270-271)

            A lot of times, you will see this kind of thought in anything you see or read. It’s a great invite for character development. At this point, Chong could give up and be what everyone thinks he is, or fight to prove to himself that he is strong.  He ends up choosing to fight for himself.

            There is a good moral here. When you’ve hit rock bottom, the only way left to go is up.