I was really looking forward to this book, and I think that’s why after reading it i’m feeling a little underwhelmed. The potential for a great story, The Program is about a futuristic society where depression and suicide is at an all time high in teenagers and has been declared an epidemic.
The story follows one main character and her close friends as they struggle with not showing any signs of emotion for fear of being flagged as ‘diseased’ with ‘depression’ and put into something called the program. The program is a government run initiative used to ‘cure’ depression. However, to cure depression the program believes in removing all negative memories. That can include entire people, experiences, etc from your life and only leaving happy ones. While this is a huge backwards way in thinking I had hoped for some inspiring perspective from the main character in regards to this topic; however she spends most of the book complaining about not knowing what to do, she is the unreasonable center of too many people’s attention for no reason (typical mary sue character) and I find the plot arch lacking.
While it does bring up the interesting debate of ‘who are you without your memories, are you still yourself’ it barely scratches the surface of an otherwise interesting topic.
Some implied scenes revolving around sex/sexuality to be aware of, as well as the characters wanting to run away from the government/their family etc. Also trigger warning almost every page for those suffering from depression/lost family to suicide/ etc which is to be expected.
Overall a 2/5, and I’d stick to grade 8 or older for a more mature reader.