By Jovanna Brinck
Courier Columnist
The Program by Suzanne Young is about a dystopian society where depression and suicide are epidemics for teenagers across the world. This book centers in on the city where the main character, Sloane lives in. When teens show symptoms of being depressed, they are sent off to the Program. The Program is meant to cure people, but it is rumored that they force medication down patients’ throats and erase their memories. People who make it out of the Program are never the same afterwards and they forget about their friends and the social life they had.
Sloane is watched very carefully during school by her parents and teachers as they are taught to watch out for and report signs of depression. She is seen as at-risk because her older brother and friend committed suicide. She confides in her boyfriend, James, who was her brother’s best friend and was there when he committed suicide. Sloane can’t be sad around her family or else they’ll think that she needs to be sent off to the Program, so she only shows her true feelings when she is around James.
Sloane and James start to notice that there is an increase in the amount of students being taken to the Program. When they try to talk to their friend who was put into the Program and realize that she has no idea who they are, they agree that it would be better to die than have their pasts wiped clean of memories.
Sloane and James have a plan that they just have to stick it out for a couple more months until they turn 18. Once they are adults, they can’t be taken to the Program anymore. As long as they can hide their feelings for a couple more months, they will be able to go away from this society and live life normally.
This is until James falls into a deep depression and is taken to the Program. Sloane waits for him to come back to see if he will still remember her somehow. He doesn’t and this makes her sadder than ever, since this is the only person Sloane really trusts. She tries her best not to be taken to the Program, but her parents can see how unhappy she is.
It is best to go into this book not knowing too much. Telling anymore about this book would give away some key points that make this book as good as it is. Just know that the Program was far better than I would have ever thought it would be. I couldn’t put this book down because I was dying to know what would happen next.
As I said before, this book deals a lot with depression so if that is something that you do not like reading about I wouldn’t recommend it. However, I would have to say that it deals with depression in a very interesting way that makes it not as sad to read about. In this society, it isn’t okay to be sad, but everyone gets sad sometimes. This aspect of the book made it very intriguing to read. If you’re looking for a great dystopian book, that is somewhat similar to 1984 by George Orwell, this is a good book to read.
