The Underground World

Authors Note: This is my speech piece on the City of Ember.

Imagine living in a dark underground world where there is very little light, no warmth from the sun, and no hope for a surviving city. In the City of Ember, the people are losing hope for their falling apart city.

            In the beginning of the book as a reader you get a feeling that life stinks for the people of the city. As you kept on reading and when Lina and Doon the two main characters get assigned their jobs of messenger and pipe works. You realize that life does stink if you have to draw your job out of a draw string bag. Then on the first day of the job and when Doon goes down into the Pipe works you get a feeling of that the city is going to fold in, and that there is no hope for the people. Then there is the question if that if the City wasn’t there how it would change the book?

            If the setting of the book was different there would be no point of the book, say it was over the ground and got sunlight, there would be no point because they could hunt for food, they could dig for water, and they could use the sunlight for warmth and power.

Then since the setting is where it is the plot doesn’t have to change because, it totally makes since, after 241 years a generator can only power so much, so that is why the plot is perfect. Then if the characters are in a different setting the book would have totally different characters.

            The setting makes the characters that they are because without the problems that are going on with the city, they would have no business saving something that doesn’t need to be saved. Say the setting was over the ground they would just be regular people. 

            The city of ember is a book that can’t have a setting that is anything different than it is and if it was the book would have no purpose.