So, earlier I was under the impression that Peeps didn’t have a sequel, but ah, it does: The Last Days.

To sum up my reaction, I read the book in two days, but I was ultimately kind of disappointed. It shares some similarities with Westerfeld’s other novels (I’m specifically referring to the Uglies series), but those similarities don’t serve this book as well as they did, say, Extras.

For example, The Last Days is basically about a band getting together and trying to make it big, except it’s set against a backdrop of a spreading epidemic that basically turns people into vampires. Similarly, Extras is about our fame-obsessed culture and one girl trying to make it big, except it has a futuristic backdrop and a possible plan to end the world woven into the story. Furthermore, like Extras, The Last Days sort of forgets about the previous main characters and starts afresh, with only a few appearances from Cal, Lace, and others.

This formula (the idea of looking at a teen wish through a new lens and starting with different characters) worked for me in Extras but did not appeal to me in The Last Days, for several reasons. The book switches the first-person narrator with every chapter, and we meet several band members – including Minerva, who’s obviously been infected. This is quite a departure from the engrossing format of Peeps, in which every other chapter talked about parasites; in The Last Days, that technique survives as only a single italicized page before each major section of the book, and they seem much more watered down than the detailed and surprising descriptions of Peeps. In any case, meeting so many characters just for this one book – none of whom are particularly exciting (the smart and rich one, the “fetching” one, the slow and large one…the only different one is a girl with a mental disorder, but even she ends up becoming predictable, neatly summed up as “logical” and “ethical”) – seems like a waste, especially when I as a reader had invested so much in Cal and Lace in Peeps. Furthermore, in the Uglies series, the main battle has been fought by the end of Specials, so it’s easier to let go of the main characters for Extras. The Last Days arrives at the final battle with very different characters, after an unexpected story about making a band during an impending apocalypse, and that final battle doesn’t come until the last chapters of the book, when the main characters don’t even have to fight in it (though they participate), and the so-called apocalypse is basically summarized during the epilogue.

Furthermore, because The Last Days has introduced us to new characters who function outside the Night Watch, we have to go through the whole process of watching them learn about the parasite and the underground enemy again. Maybe it’s just my preference, but though I liked the passages about band practice and band drama, I would have preferred to see the tension mounting among characters involved in the Night Watch as the “apocalypse” approaches, or to even have seen these newcomers worry more about how their city is falling apart.

I won’t say much more, besides that the way characters speak didn’t strike me as authentic as it did in other Westerfeld novels – with words like “fawesome” and “fool” instead of “awesome” and “cool,” I got the impression that either the characters or the author was trying too hard.

But I love Westerfeld, and I highly recommend Peeps and the Uglies series – but feel free to pass on The Last Days.

Also, on a separate note, the book cover is ridiculous. I can understand the image-oriented ones of the Uglies series featuring different phases of Tally’s life and all that, but this cover just doesn’t fit what the book is about.
last days

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