Link to Amazon Page for Variant

Overall Rating: 5 stars

Variant begins with Benson, a teen boy jaded by the foster system, as he pulls up his new school – an exciting program which he hopes will launch him into a new life. The moment he arrives and the car drives off, he finds that the new life he hoped for turns out to be far different than the pamphlets let on. At Maxfield Academy, no one leaves.

There are only four rules, and breaking them will get you killed. Gangs compete for jobs, in order to buy items off a prison/commissary style list with “points”. The book starts off strong with a thriller tone, and keeps things exciting throughout. Once I picked up the book, it was surprising to me how the pages would fly by.

Rob Wells does an excellent job giving us a tough-guy main character who won’t allow anyone to distract him from his one ultimate goal – escape. Maxfield lifestyle is either deadly or monotonous, and Benson considers both a danger. What then to do, when he begins to fall for another student?

Variant could easily be seen as a fun, thrilling, modern take on the Lord of the Flies-style novel, where things are dire and tensions get high. One of my favorite reads of the year, I have already taken the opportunity to gift this book to my brother and best friend, and it comes highly recommended.