Young, naive, and very sheltered, Lalage Page has grown up in near-isolation in her parents’ flat. She is sheltered from the chaos of the collapsing civilization. People are killing one another over crusts of bread and the police are detaining anyone without an identification card. With things getting more dangerous outside, Lalla’s father decides it is time to use their escape route – a ship he has built for them and the five hundred people it can hold.

Once they get underway, Lalla realizes the utopia her father has created isn’t everything it seems. There is more food than anyone can eat but no way to grow more; there are more clothes than any one can wear but no way to mend them. And no one can tell her – or is willing to tell her – where they are going.

Going by just the premise alone, one would think The Ship would be a fascinating and nail-biting read. Even the little blurbs on the cover made me think this and so I was quite eager to begin reading this book. I was hoping for something dark, something that would keep me up at night reading despite the fact that I had to work the next day. Something that I could really sink my teeth in to.

What I ended up with was just over 300 pages of a whiny, self-absorbed teenager and her ‘poor me!’ attitude.

Lalage Page is the main character of The Ship and everything is told from her perspective. She is sixteen years old and has apparently spent the majority of her life confined to the four walls of her parents’ flat in London. The only times she leaves the safety of the flat is when she goes out with her mother; either to the National Museum or out on some errand for food or something. What interaction she has with the outside world is through her screen, which is likely akin to an iPad or other similar device. The little interaction she has with actual people is with the homeless living in the National Museum, and even then she bemoans this as boring and as taking her mother’s attention away from her.

This isolation causes Lalage to be somewhat stunted emotionally. She is very naive, to the point that she does not understand that food spoils and she attempts to eat a fake apple, believing it to be real. She has trouble relating to the other people on the ship, even ones that are relatively close to her age. When her mother dies, Lalla mourns but really only in a “How could she do this to me?” kind of way. She gives little thought to how the death affects her father or to any one else on the ship.

This does not mean that the others on the ship are without their own problems. Lalla’s father, Michael, seems to develop a kind of Messiah complex over the occupants on the ship. Even before they set sail he sees himself as their savior, the shepherd leading his flock to a new life. Some of the speeches he gives can even be viewed as proselytizing. He urges the people of the ship to give up their old lives and not speak of the time before, he tells them the ship is their new home for now and for always.

And the people of the ship follow him, almost blindly it seems. At his encouragement they seem more than happy to discard the few memories of their loved ones, tossing them over the side of the ship and in to the water. When Lalla questions them, wondering why they could simply throw items once considered precious away, each claims they are happier without them.

As an avid reader, I find that I enjoy a book more when I can relate to the main character in some way. Even if it is something small, even if it is that I simply like how a character acts, I am more likely to enjoy reading about that person. Unfortunately, such was not the case with Lalla. I found her to be irritating and at times downright annoying. I found her to be whiny and self absorbed. If her internal character had started like this and changed over the course of the story, that would be understandable and even enjoyable. Since this was not the case, I could not relate to her in any form.

With such an interesting premise, The Ship had a great deal of promise to be a riveting read. Sadly, such was not the case. Skip this one, dear readers. You’ll thank me for it.