Nevermore was written by James Patterson. This is the eighth and final novel in the Maximum Ride series, as you can see by the R.I.P. sticker.
Max, Dylan, Nudge, Gazzy, and Iggy are all going to a prestigious private school. Max didn’t want to go, but it makes Dylan and Nudge happy to pretend to be normal. They were going to walk to school, but Max had enough of trying to be 100% human, so she flew there with Dylan close behind. Dylan, being the clone of some hot guy, is pined after by all the human girls, who shoot dagger glares at Max for him liking her. One of the white coat scientists is her teacher. She has suspicions on the day he has the class do disections on baby chickens (you can sympathize with them since they were created that way and were tortured in “the School”) and escorts Dylan and Iggy out. Dylan comes back for books and the evil teacher/scientist tells him that the only way to protect Max is for him to kill Fang.
Fang, Maya (Max II), and their gang are living like the flock used to. They live in the wilderness and are always on the move. They’r driving toward California, but their plan is foiled when a pack of supposed-to-be-extinct Erasers (lab creations of werewolves with patched on bird wings). The head of the Erasers is none other than Max’s half-brother, Ari, who’s supposed to be dead. This isn’t the first time he’s come back to life; in fact, it’s his third. They attack. The gang discovers that two of their members are traitors and are on the side of the Erasers. Then, Ari kills Maya and promises to come back for Fang. Fang buries Maya and then disbands the gang.
Angel didn’t really die. She was kidnapped by the scientists of the School to be experimented on again. She is seeing the future of everything that’s going to happen. Angel wishes that Max was there to help her. The scientists also do what they did to Iggy’s eyes and make her blind. Max’s parents are on the side of the scientists (I didn’t expect Dr. Martinez to be on their side). Jeb claims to care about her, but that always makes me ask: if you care about them so much, then why do you turn them into experiments and treat them as less than human? Jeb also explains that he cloned Ari again and created new Erasers. It’s getting ridiculous with how much they keep cloning and bringing dead people back to life.
The Voice starts talking to the bird kids again. It tells Max to harden her heart. Dylan is told to win Max’s heart. Gazzy and Iggy are told to protect Max with their lives. Nudge is told to document everything that happens either by video, paper and pen, or with a blog. Fang is told to go back to Max and stay with her. They all listen to the Voice and don’t question it.
Max goes on a date with Dylan. She kisses him and finds out that Nudge was filming this. The only reason she doesn’t destroy the camera is because Nudge tells her that the Voice told her that she had to record everything. Max destroys the nice tree house on accident. Dylan and Max also chaperone a date that Nudge goes on at the movies. When the movie is over, Ari shows up and surprises Max. He doesn’t attack, but tells Dylan that he doesn’t need to worry about doing something (that something being killing Fang), that Ari will take care of it. I’m surprised that Max didn’t press Dylan about what Ari was talking about.
Fang’s wing is broken, so he can’t fly. He knows it’s dangerous, but he decides to hitch hike. The people who pick him up are, of course, Erasers. They throw him off a cliff.
The flock is living in this house. They are awakened by alarms going off to find Fang on their doorstep. Yes, he survived the fall. They patch him up.
They find out through Fang’s blog that Angel is at the School, alive. They organize a rescue mission. The scientists leave as parts of the school are destroyed. The flock shows up and find angel strapped down on her back on one of the lab tables, nearly dead. She’s still blind and is pretty sure that she can’t fly, maybe forever. They take her home. Her vision and flying slowly improve. At one point, he tries to confess his feelings to Max, but she flies away. He catches up to her and tells her and she admits that she feels the same. Then, she kisses him. Dylan goes into a rage and leaves a path of destruction in the nearby town. The rest of the flock sees this in the news.
Then they are attacked by Erasers who are there for Fang. Just before the fight, Jeb tells them that Fang has DNA that could be the key to immortality. To keep the earth from being over-populated by humans and from Fang being a vegetable, Jeb’s solution is to kill Fang. Fang and Max kill Ari, which kills the Erasers. They also knock out Jeb. The flock is patching themselves up. Then Dr. Martinez shows up. Angel tries to tell Max that Dr. Martinez was helping the scientists at the School. Dr. Martinez tells them that she was on the wrong side and wants to take them away from all of this. Angel scans her brain and determines that Dr. Martinez is telling them the truth and doesn’t seem to want to hurt them.
Dr. Martinez takes them to a tropical island. They each have their own tree houses. They’re also introduced to a bunch of other bird kids. The flock is told about the 99 percent plan. The plan is to wipe out the humans with this disease that mutates too fast to make a cure for. The bird kids are immune to it. Dylan comes flying back to warn them that something is going to fall from the sky and hit the earth. Something does fall from the sky and destroy life except for those on the island. The world is now perfect for the bird kids to live. The conditions are for flying and breathing underwater. Angel also reveals a major secret. This is one thing I will not mention, so you have to read the book!
It was a fast read, as usual. It was fast-paced with a lot of mind-blowing parts. Mr. Patterson went all out with surprising us in every chapter. Nothing was really predictable, so it was great. I recommend you read this.
Genres: Adventure, Science Fiction, Romance, Children’t Literature
Stars (out of 5): *****
Cat on the Bookshelf 
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