--- product_id: 10984639 title: "Gone" price: "€ 28.79" currency: EUR in_stock: true reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.be/products/10984639-gone store_origin: BE region: Belgium --- # Gone **Price:** € 28.79 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** Gone - **How much does it cost?** € 28.79 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.be](https://www.desertcart.be/products/10984639-gone) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description The first book in the bestselling cult YA thriller series GONE that Stephen King calls a "driving, torrential narrative." "I am now free to leave the FAYZ, but my time there was well spent." —Stephen King Welcome to the FAYZ. In the blink of an eye all the adults disappear in a small town in southern California and no one knows why. Cut off from the outside world, those that are left are trapped, and there’s no help on the way. Sam Temple and his friends must do all they can to survive. Chaos rules the streets. Gangs begin to form. Sides are chosen – strong or weak. Cruel or humane. And then there are those who begin to develop powers… The GONE series is Lord of the Flies for the 21st century. In turns breathtaking, harrowing, and utterly terrifying. Its complex characters and moral dilemmas will delight fans of The Hunger Games, Divergent and The Maze Runner. This is dystopian fiction at its best. And if your teenage boys are reluctant to read, this is the series for them! Have you read all 6 titles in the New York Times bestselling saga? Gone Hunger Lies Plague Fear Light Review: In it for the Long Haul - Title: Gone Author: Michael Grant Rating: 4.5 Stars My Review Ok, on some level, I didn't want to like Gone. I think that this may be hard to explain. Maybe it is the monumental task of taking on this series. A 550 page debut with a 600 page follow up and 4 more to come? Daunting. And I'm actually a fan of EPIC storytelling. I also didn't want to like it because as it got started, I could sense that this was going to be one of *those* stories: ones with a ton of characters, a ton of POVs, and a ton of question marks with no immediate answers. Now, I like lots o' characters (been accused of abusing people's tolerance for numbers myself) and I like multiple POVs, but the questions marks with no immediate answers part makes me nervous. I'm always unnerved when an author takes on so much, with the implied promise that we'll understand it all at some point, only to find that it's sealed with a pretty bow such as, "It was all a dream," or, "The characters were really all dead," or, "What do you mean I didn't explain everything? Of course I did." Sigh. Some people LOVE this kind of thing, but it irks me to no end. BUT - I have hope for Gone and will stick with it. If I end up buying the whole series and being disappointed, believe me, the review will reap the whirlwind, but for now I will reserve judgement. On to the real review. I've given this book 4.5 stars because despite my trepidation, I really enjoyed it. The plot kept the pages turning and there were a lot of twists to fill the 550 pages. I also am a fan of dark tales, sci-fi tales, and tales with a large scope, so I was pleased to find that in Gone. I do have to say that the author is very brave. He uses a ton of different viewpoints (many people say you can't do third person omniscient for ya but I disagree. Head jumping is easy to me...) I like that because it paints a more well-rounded picture. He also is not doing any one genre in it's pure form. This isn't just science-fiction, it isn't just fantasy, and it isn't just apocalpytic. At times it feels most like a graphic novel (though I'm not an expert in this). If I had to sum it up, I'd say it's a cross between The Lord of the Flies and X-Men. I liked the main characters of Astrid and Sam (though the cover pic of Astrid doesn't fit at all with what I pictured...she's too dainty and fairy like instead of the stiff, buttoned up girl you first meet). I like Sam's struggles with rejecting power and then being forced to use it for good. I enjoyed the changes in their relationship over time...they felt real within the context of a very unreal situation. I also liked the portrayal of teens who are devastated by the loss of their parents. It's not all candy and ice cream, it's a topsy-turvey world without rules and they don't just celebrate. I also liked the portrayal of Quinn. He felt tragically flawed and tragically real, in the end. There is A LOT going on in this story and it increases, rather than decreases over time. If you like stories that get more and more complex as they go on, you'll like this one. What I Didn't Like Obviously with a 4.5 rating, there was little that I didn't like, and none of it was serious. Mainly, I felt that the villains were too one-dimensional. That may be what made it feel more graphic novel-y to me, though that may not be fair to graphic novels. But let's put it this way, the main villain is named Caine, to start. I thought, really? Caine. And he and his cohort are, for the most part, devoid of humanity of any kind. For me, it's just a preference that villains have as much "to" them and their villainy as the heroes, and I'm not sure I got that. Of course, their lack of humanity is what makes them scarier, so again, this is a small criticism. The possibility of being disappointed. I'm not going to beat this to death, but with everything going on in this story, there is the potential that it is resolved unsatisfactorily or not at all. But I guess it has to be a pretty good story for me to fear this in the first place, so I plan to stick with it to see what Grant does. BTW, if you want an ending that wraps everything up for this book...you'll be disappointed. It's not for you if you're not in for the series. I recommend this to fans of large, detailed, epic stories of struggle and triumph...with a little fantasy/magic thrown in. But be warned, this is pretty DARK! There is some violence and some young children suffering (see Lord of the Flies reference above). It's an apocalypse (or something), not a chick-lit summer tale. :) Review: Excellent... contradiction from the typical YA novel! - I have been on a Young Adult Dystopia kick lately and yeesh--the books I've read, but Michael Grants "Gone" was a breath of fresh air! I've noticed with my recent batch of YA Dystopia's they all have a general lack of depth. Michael Grant's novel is the contradiction. Specifically, the typical way YA novels establish the villain and the hero is simplistic. For example, an author may establish a character as "the bad guy" because that character wants to hurt a lot of people or, simpler still, bully some kids, and the other character is intended as "the good guy" because he wants to stop the bad guy. That's as far as they go into distinguishing the good guys from the bad guys. Such a simplistic approach is necessary for 5 year old children, but too basic for our "junior adults." There are much more sophisticated methods to establishing the hero/villain, methods which Grant uses well. Grant shows sometimes it is not always so clear who is good and bad. Maybe a character is physically "doing" good things, great things even, but their motives are wrong. Does doing the right thing for the wrong reason still make it the right thing? How do you deal with someone like that? What do you do? This is just a few of many questions Grant explores. Grants characters are complex and thus, very appealing. Typical YA authors: Suppose a character is established as "tough." Alright, now, everything the character does is tough. They act tough, are very blunt, get into fist fights, and have dangerous hobbies. Very predictable. This method is overused in YA novels. People's personalities are usually so much more compound. Grant's method: His "tough" character has a pleasant disposition; they are likeable to their peers, etc. Yet, surprisingly, they can bring down their enemies with great feats of bravery or can remain unintimidated in threatening situations. These unsuspecting attributes keep the reader interested. Interesting story line; perfect balance of action, mystery, wonder, introspection, extrospection, romance, victories, defeats, redemption. Perfect pace; not to slow, not too fast. This book is more like a mild science fiction-horror with its eerie, unnatural, and supernatural aspects. Appreciatively, Grant occasionally employs a small amount of humor throughout, which gives the reader a much needed break from the anxiety commonly experienced in a horror novel. The writing is geared towards teenagers, thus characters minds wander on childish fixations, they use a lot of slang, and the author might not stay long enough on a subject to an adult's satisfaction. As long as the adult reader remembers who the intended audience is; they'll be satisfied with the book. 5 stars suggests brilliance. When I compare Gone to other well done YA books, Jennifer Donnelly's "Revolutions", Lois Lowry's "The Giver", my first impression is "Gone" is not quite as well done-4.5 stars ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #28,335 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #31 in Teen & Young Adult Survival Stories #74 in Teen & Young Adult Dystopian #159 in Teen & Young Adult Science Fiction & Dystopian Romance | | Customer Reviews | 4.4 out of 5 stars 6,735 Reviews | ## Images ![Gone - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81GbBJr+ANL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ In it for the Long Haul *by R***. on August 3, 2012* Title: Gone Author: Michael Grant Rating: 4.5 Stars My Review Ok, on some level, I didn't want to like Gone. I think that this may be hard to explain. Maybe it is the monumental task of taking on this series. A 550 page debut with a 600 page follow up and 4 more to come? Daunting. And I'm actually a fan of EPIC storytelling. I also didn't want to like it because as it got started, I could sense that this was going to be one of *those* stories: ones with a ton of characters, a ton of POVs, and a ton of question marks with no immediate answers. Now, I like lots o' characters (been accused of abusing people's tolerance for numbers myself) and I like multiple POVs, but the questions marks with no immediate answers part makes me nervous. I'm always unnerved when an author takes on so much, with the implied promise that we'll understand it all at some point, only to find that it's sealed with a pretty bow such as, "It was all a dream," or, "The characters were really all dead," or, "What do you mean I didn't explain everything? Of course I did." Sigh. Some people LOVE this kind of thing, but it irks me to no end. BUT - I have hope for Gone and will stick with it. If I end up buying the whole series and being disappointed, believe me, the review will reap the whirlwind, but for now I will reserve judgement. On to the real review. I've given this book 4.5 stars because despite my trepidation, I really enjoyed it. The plot kept the pages turning and there were a lot of twists to fill the 550 pages. I also am a fan of dark tales, sci-fi tales, and tales with a large scope, so I was pleased to find that in Gone. I do have to say that the author is very brave. He uses a ton of different viewpoints (many people say you can't do third person omniscient for ya but I disagree. Head jumping is easy to me...) I like that because it paints a more well-rounded picture. He also is not doing any one genre in it's pure form. This isn't just science-fiction, it isn't just fantasy, and it isn't just apocalpytic. At times it feels most like a graphic novel (though I'm not an expert in this). If I had to sum it up, I'd say it's a cross between The Lord of the Flies and X-Men. I liked the main characters of Astrid and Sam (though the cover pic of Astrid doesn't fit at all with what I pictured...she's too dainty and fairy like instead of the stiff, buttoned up girl you first meet). I like Sam's struggles with rejecting power and then being forced to use it for good. I enjoyed the changes in their relationship over time...they felt real within the context of a very unreal situation. I also liked the portrayal of teens who are devastated by the loss of their parents. It's not all candy and ice cream, it's a topsy-turvey world without rules and they don't just celebrate. I also liked the portrayal of Quinn. He felt tragically flawed and tragically real, in the end. There is A LOT going on in this story and it increases, rather than decreases over time. If you like stories that get more and more complex as they go on, you'll like this one. What I Didn't Like Obviously with a 4.5 rating, there was little that I didn't like, and none of it was serious. Mainly, I felt that the villains were too one-dimensional. That may be what made it feel more graphic novel-y to me, though that may not be fair to graphic novels. But let's put it this way, the main villain is named Caine, to start. I thought, really? Caine. And he and his cohort are, for the most part, devoid of humanity of any kind. For me, it's just a preference that villains have as much "to" them and their villainy as the heroes, and I'm not sure I got that. Of course, their lack of humanity is what makes them scarier, so again, this is a small criticism. The possibility of being disappointed. I'm not going to beat this to death, but with everything going on in this story, there is the potential that it is resolved unsatisfactorily or not at all. But I guess it has to be a pretty good story for me to fear this in the first place, so I plan to stick with it to see what Grant does. BTW, if you want an ending that wraps everything up for this book...you'll be disappointed. It's not for you if you're not in for the series. I recommend this to fans of large, detailed, epic stories of struggle and triumph...with a little fantasy/magic thrown in. But be warned, this is pretty DARK! There is some violence and some young children suffering (see Lord of the Flies reference above). It's an apocalypse (or something), not a chick-lit summer tale. :) ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Excellent... contradiction from the typical YA novel! *by A***A on January 12, 2013* I have been on a Young Adult Dystopia kick lately and yeesh--the books I've read, but Michael Grants "Gone" was a breath of fresh air! I've noticed with my recent batch of YA Dystopia's they all have a general lack of depth. Michael Grant's novel is the contradiction. Specifically, the typical way YA novels establish the villain and the hero is simplistic. For example, an author may establish a character as "the bad guy" because that character wants to hurt a lot of people or, simpler still, bully some kids, and the other character is intended as "the good guy" because he wants to stop the bad guy. That's as far as they go into distinguishing the good guys from the bad guys. Such a simplistic approach is necessary for 5 year old children, but too basic for our "junior adults." There are much more sophisticated methods to establishing the hero/villain, methods which Grant uses well. Grant shows sometimes it is not always so clear who is good and bad. Maybe a character is physically "doing" good things, great things even, but their motives are wrong. Does doing the right thing for the wrong reason still make it the right thing? How do you deal with someone like that? What do you do? This is just a few of many questions Grant explores. Grants characters are complex and thus, very appealing. Typical YA authors: Suppose a character is established as "tough." Alright, now, everything the character does is tough. They act tough, are very blunt, get into fist fights, and have dangerous hobbies. Very predictable. This method is overused in YA novels. People's personalities are usually so much more compound. Grant's method: His "tough" character has a pleasant disposition; they are likeable to their peers, etc. Yet, surprisingly, they can bring down their enemies with great feats of bravery or can remain unintimidated in threatening situations. These unsuspecting attributes keep the reader interested. Interesting story line; perfect balance of action, mystery, wonder, introspection, extrospection, romance, victories, defeats, redemption. Perfect pace; not to slow, not too fast. This book is more like a mild science fiction-horror with its eerie, unnatural, and supernatural aspects. Appreciatively, Grant occasionally employs a small amount of humor throughout, which gives the reader a much needed break from the anxiety commonly experienced in a horror novel. The writing is geared towards teenagers, thus characters minds wander on childish fixations, they use a lot of slang, and the author might not stay long enough on a subject to an adult's satisfaction. As long as the adult reader remembers who the intended audience is; they'll be satisfied with the book. 5 stars suggests brilliance. When I compare Gone to other well done YA books, Jennifer Donnelly's "Revolutions", Lois Lowry's "The Giver", my first impression is "Gone" is not quite as well done-4.5 stars ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Crazy Dark Series! *by O***N on March 25, 2013* One would think with the crazy first weeks of school, I would have no time to plow through an almost 600 paged book, but Gone, by Michael Grant, does not give you the opportunity to put it down. From the first five pages, this book grabs you by the seat of the pants and hurls you through a creepy post-apocalyptic world where all people over the age of 14 simply disappear- *poof* and gone. Sam, also known as School Bus Sam after he rescued his school bus full of kids when the driver had a heart attack, was once a hero, but has faded back into the wallflower he is happiest being. When all the adults and kids over 14 disappear in Perdido Beach, though, Sam is the one all the other kids start looking to for guidance. No one know what happened to the adults, but right in front of their eyes, they all just disappeared. Sam is reluctant to be their leader, but when he rushes into a burning building to save a little girl, it is clear heroism is simply in his nature. With the help of his friends, Astrid, Edilio, and Quinn, they set off to find Astrid's autistic little brother and hopefully some adults. What they find, however, is that a giant, electrified border has made a circle around the whole area- exactly a 10 mile radius all around the nuclear power plant. Nothing can come in and no one can get out. Something strange is also happening to everything and everyone living within the wall. The animals are mutating and some of the kids are starting to develop powers. The real showdown, however, starts when the Coates Academy kids (a school for delinquent rich kids) come down from the school to take over as leaders of Perdido Beach. Their leader, Caine, is all too willing to use his powers to gain control or let his evil sidekick, Drake, wield his menacing punishments. Kids are beaten to death for defying Caine's rules, food is an ever-growing concern, and safety becomes a luxury. Can Sam come to terms with his own power? Can he, with the support of his friends, become a true leader among the kids inside the wall? This is an amazing story about kids forced to grow up quickly. When they have to defend themselves with guns found at the power plant, Sam finds himself struggling with the idea of asking 8th graders to wield guns while being horrified at asking a 5th or 6th grader to defend themselves. This story has a lot of Lord of the Flies themes as civilized life quickly breaks down. The lead characters are the embodiment of good and evil, with consciences and cravings for power being the ultimate battle. Kids are quickly given roles of nurse, day care operator, guard, and cook. These same kids had parents and adults to take care of them not 24 hours earlier. It is a harsh new world where anything is possible. The reading level is relatively accessible, but the story is very, very long. It is action packed and there isn't a dull moment in the whole story, but 500+ pages is a lot to ask of a middle school student. Therefore, I would save this great story for an older kid who reads a lot or is really into this type of story. It might overwhelm a struggling reader who isn't ready for such a long book. Otherwise, I would suggest everyone give this book a try! It has a little bit of everything from an apocalypse to supernatural powers! You can't ask for much more! Just be careful when picking up the next two books. The second book is Hunger, and the third is Lies. I accidentally picked up the third book and ruined a little of the second story before I even got a chance to read it! Oh well. It won't stop be from reading the next two books!! --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.be/products/10984639-gone](https://www.desertcart.be/products/10984639-gone) --- *Product available on Desertcart Belgium* *Store origin: BE* *Last updated: 2026-05-25*