A new month means a brand-new Book of the Month, and August’s selection immediately grabbed my attention with its dystopian premise, deadly reality show, and razor-sharp social commentary.
✨ Survival Show by Juno Dawson
This gripping YA dystopian thriller combines a televised singing competition with brutal survival stakes, following a young woman who enters the world’s biggest talent show to save her family—only to discover that losing the competition means losing her life. Blending suspense, political intrigue, and emotional depth, Survival Show promises a thrilling story full of impossible choices, dangerous secrets, and the fight to survive when the whole world is watching.
Synopsis
American Idol meets The Hunger Games in this campy, dystopian satire about a teen betting her life that her singing talent can make her a star from the celebrated author of This Book Is Gay, Juno Dawson.
The world just seems to take and take from Taryn Beck, but there’s one thing it’ll never have: her voice. Only when she’s singing does Taryn feel like she can escape her reality—free from the aftermath of the War, free from the Scottish refugee camps where she and her family now live, and free from the responsibility of making ends meet for the sake of her sick brother.
Taryn’s voice is her one ticket out, and that’s why she enters to be a contestant on the world’s most watched television program: Starmaker, where kids from the New Peace Global Alliance compete for the chance to join an all-singing, all-dancing pop group. Rise to the top, and a life of luxury, stardom, and money awaits.
There’s only one small catch. The lowest ranking face a televised public execution. Starmaker thanks their participants for their noble sacrifice to Project Population.
Taryn’s about to sing for her life.
