Coffee For The Brain Book Tournament – Round 2 Decision – Compound vs. Dead and Gone

Thanks to the two sixth grade judges for reading and reviewing these two novels. I love it when students take on such an active role. 














We chose The Compound over The Dead and the Gone.Both books were a lot of the trying to stay alive idea. We liked the ending of The Compound better than the ending of The Dead and the Gone though. In The Compound, the end was exactly the perfect, kind of unrealistic ending that a lot of books have. The Dead and the Gone has more of a, “Is it actually good, or does this just lead to something else that’s worse?” Even though this book has a sequel, looking at the book itself, it just isn’t as good. In both stories, the main character has a lot of friends and family members that die, but in The Compound, it turns out that the people you thought were dead, weren’t. All the people in The Dead and the Gone that you thought were dead, were dead, so it was less cheerful. Also, The Compound is one of those books, where you can figure things out before the main character if you play close enough attention. 

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