Inside Out

In Natalie Hibberd’s debut novel, we meet a dystopian world ruled by chaos. The defining feature of this chaos? Two factors of society labelled ‘The Outside’ and ‘The Inside’. The Inside is privileged and knows nothing but hate for The Outsiders. Their terrorism and wickedness make their lives deadly and filled with threats. Meanwhile, The Outside doesn’t have it much better. Unlike The Inside, they have nothing in the terms of privilege and are often on the brink of destitution. It’s a world divided in half. More and more young people are getting involved in this war between the two factions and it’s getting catastrophic. The Freedom Fighters, a terrorist organization from The Outside, are getting plenty of members and it’s creating a strain for The Inside. Our main characters, Zach and Layna, are from both The Inside and The Outside respectively and in crucial positions of leadership. Yet, it seems like these two might have more in common than we think. Inside Out reminded me a lot of The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton, with its gritty melodrama and sharp social commentary. The classes are divided by the fortunate and unfortunate, and the setup creates an entertaining dystopia society that long time fans of modern young adult literature will recognize and appreciate. Natalie Hibberd’s world-building is vivid and deep. Both The Inside and The Outside are set up to be very different places that intersect in the most curious of ways, and the stark contrast is easy to envision. The setting was brilliant and the premise was interesting but I had a hard time differentiating so many characters. Don’t get me wrong, I loved our two main characters but I felt like their character development, and the story progress, was interrupted by the introduction of side characters. While this does setup a variety of characters that will be fun to follow as the series progresses, I wanted more time with our protagonists as I found them to be very interesting. Inside Out is an impressive debut novel for Natalie Hibbard. This is a thrilling young adult novel that fans of dystopian science fiction will eat up. Inside Out is a very entertaining beginning to what promises to be a poignant and rousing series.