Hughes’s version of socialism taken to an extreme is not an argument ad absurdum, but a valid consideration of a possible outcome of the Basic Income economic policy if poorly implemented. In Invitation, however, one of the options-indeed the most common option, it seems-is “Unemployed.” This adds a political complexity to the novel that is missing from many YA dystopias. As in Lois Lowry’s The Giver (1993), they are assigned a role in their society, with no recourse should the assignment be unwelcome. As in Never Let Me Go, a group of teens have graduated from high school and are starting out as adults in the working world, only to discover that they are unwilling pawns in a governmental program. The premise of Invitation to The Game is simple. So I was not shocked when I finally checked the publication date of Invitation to The Game (1990) and realized that-for the most part-it cannot be derivative, because it came before most of the stories whose shadows were filling in the corners of my reading experience. This last one I often have had to rectify shortly after beginning, especially when something feels familiar, or anachronistic. Here, I have to admit my strong tendency to dive right into books, without reading about the authors, their other books, the setting of their stories, or anything, including the date the book was written. The layers were so thin, and so many, that the novel did not feel entirely derivative, as some do. The differences were significant, the plots entirely different but as the narrative progressed I felt shadowy layers of other YA dystopias building into a palimpsest of characters and setting and tone. The set-up was so strongly reminiscent of my recollection of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (2005) that the images overlapped as I read.

Once I began the book, I was quickly sucked into the narrative, enough to forget the problem with the typeface. The font is too dark, the characters’ size and shape irregular, and the leading too close.

Harper Trophy Canada really should think a bit more about their printing process. My first impression of Monica Hughes’s Invitation to The Game was not favourable, but that has everything to do with the publisher, and nothing to do with the story.

Invitation to the Game by Monica Hughes