Maggot Moon (2012 Costa Children's Book Award)

A 2014 Michael L. Printz Honor Book
A 2012 Costa Children's Book Award

What if the football hadn't gone over the wall. On the other side of the wall there is a dark secret. And the devil. And the Moon Man. And the Motherland doesn't want anyone to know. But Standish Treadwell — who has different-colored eyes, who can't read, can't write, Standish Treadwell isn't bright — sees things differently than the rest of the "train-track thinkers." So when Standish and his only friend and neighbor, Hector, make their way to the other side of the wall, they see what the Motherland has been hiding. And it's big...

Staff Review
Just when it seems that there's nothing new under the dystopian sun, comes Gardner's compelling story, set in a ruthless regime, about an unlikely teenager who risks everything in the name of trust and friendship.

Standish Treadwell and his grandfather live in Zone Seven, where outcasts and political anarchists are sent. They have nothing except some scraps of food to get them through the winter and contraband television. Unable to read and write and desperate to escape from school brutality and a life of deprivation, Standish spends much of his time in a fantasy world. It was only when his best friend Hector disappears and he becomes a focus for the military police, that Standish decides that it's time to make a stand and expose the truth.

Although some chapters are only half a page, and the story is told in an original first-person voice, Maggot Moon propels its readers through a narrative that will not only reel you in, confuses you with its dark humor, and horrifies you as you feel so immersed in Standish's world.  IT IS THAT KIND of book. Truly unforgettable.