The Last Wild by Piers Torday (review)

The animal population has been decimated in the last decade by the red-eye virus, and the human population isn’t faring too well either, setting up massive quarantines in cities and living on Formula-A (and the company that owns it) as the food supply dwindles. Meanwhile, twelve-year-old Kester, mute since his mother’s death and locked away in the Spectrum Hall Academy for Challenging Children, discovers a cockroach with the ability to talk to him. The insect, along with hundreds of its brethren, busts Kester out of his prison, and the boy is taken to meet a majestic stag, who informs him that Kester is the “last wild,” the last hope for the survival of the remaining animals. His subsequent journey—to find the research left behind by his veterinarian father and thwart the company behind Formula-A and the redeye—is equal parts thrilling and poignant; Kester revels in new friendships, escapes dastardly bad guys, grieves for lost companions, and dares to hope that perhaps he can make a difference. A few dashes of humor, in the forms of a confused pigeon, a dance-obsessed mouse, and a comically arrogant wolf, add levity to the seriousness of Kester’s situation, and Kester himself is an appealing Everykid. Animal lovers are the obvious audience here, but so are middle-graders intrigued by post-apocalyptic worlds but not quite ready for the grimness of YA dystopias.