The Inferior (review)

This British import combines elements of The Truman Show with Lord of the Flies to produce a tense and memorable thriller about survival in a horrifying futuristic dystopia. Stopmouth has grown up knowing nothing outside of his own tribe's daily struggle to eat and not be eaten. In fact, Stopmouth's stutter decreases his value and moves him closer to being put up as a "volunteer," who could be exchanged for food. The lives of everyone are jeopardized, however, when a mysterious woman literally falls from the sky, carrying secrets about the origins of this sadistic and primitive world, information about who is actually in control, and knowledge about how to get to the Roof, beyond which another world lies. The early action plot evolves into a quest novel, as Stopmouth and Indrani, the outsider woman, attempt a nearly impossible journey toward the Roof and the salvation they imagine beyond it. Throughout, a frenzied pace and constantly evolving (and escalating) danger will likely evoke a sense of urgency in readers that is reflected in the desperate battles of the protagonists. Although few characters are explored in much depth, the surface strokes that describe the savagery both within the human tribe and in the groups of animals that hunt and are hunted by them are memorable, and these brief descriptions pair effectively with the complex landscape hinted at primarily through Stopmouth's naïve perspective. Readers may initially resist the ambiguous ending, but they will ultimately find it appropriate given the uncertainty with which everyone in this haunting world lives and dies.