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Gregor the Overlander
(Underland Chronicles #1)
by
This irresistible first novel tells the story of a quiet boy who embarks on a dangerous quest in order to fulfill his destiny—and find his father—in a strange world beneath New York City.
When Gregor falls through a grate in the laundry room of his apartment building, he hurtles into the dark Underland, where spiders, rats, cockroaches coexist uneasily with humans. This wor
...more
When Gregor falls through a grate in the laundry room of his apartment building, he hurtles into the dark Underland, where spiders, rats, cockroaches coexist uneasily with humans. This wor
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Paperback, 326 pages
Published
May 1st 2005
by Scholastic
(first published September 1st 2003)
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Start your review of Gregor the Overlander (Underland Chronicles, #1)
I recently went solo dining with the 2nd book in the series and sat down at a counter, speeding through the large font and well-spaced text. The restaurant started to fill up and another solo diner sat down next to me. I glanced over at his magazine and saw that it was a scientific journal open to an article about the brain. I casually angled the cover of my Scholastic-published book away from his view and kept reading, very self-conscious of the approximately 18 grades of school between our rea
...more
so this is how superweak my life is: on friday i rushed home from work in the rain to get some homework done. whee... but then i ended up writing that wuthering heights review, inspired by the rain and the clouds etc. and i did some work, but not a ton. and i thought to myself, what do i really want to be doing? and the answer was - put on my pajamas, eat peanut butter pretzels and read unchallenging children's books. so i did. and you can all suck it, with your parties and balls and galas. 'cuz
...more
When Gregor falls after his little sister down the laundry shoot he finds himself in a new land. He is faced with deciding where to place his loyalties, how to survive and given the opportunity to search for his father who unaccountably disappeared 2 years ago.
This book has ruined my entire day! I have laundry to fold, dinner to cook, breakfast to eat, 3 papers to write and lesson plans to develop. Instead, I've spent my morning snuggled under a down quilt devouring Gregor the Overlander. As so ...more
This book has ruined my entire day! I have laundry to fold, dinner to cook, breakfast to eat, 3 papers to write and lesson plans to develop. Instead, I've spent my morning snuggled under a down quilt devouring Gregor the Overlander. As so ...more
Gregor the Overlander (Underland Chronicles, #1), Suzanne Collins
The Underland Chronicles is a series of five epic fantasy novels by Suzanne Collins, first published between 2003 and 2007. It tells the story of a boy named Gregor and his adventures in the "Underland", a subterranean world located under New York City. The Underland is inhabited by humans who traveled below hundreds of years ago, along with various giant versions of creatures like bats, cockroaches, and rats. According to the auth ...more
The Underland Chronicles is a series of five epic fantasy novels by Suzanne Collins, first published between 2003 and 2007. It tells the story of a boy named Gregor and his adventures in the "Underland", a subterranean world located under New York City. The Underland is inhabited by humans who traveled below hundreds of years ago, along with various giant versions of creatures like bats, cockroaches, and rats. According to the auth ...more
Feb 05, 2009
Meredith Holley
rated it
it was amazing
Recommends it for:
School Teachers and Librarians
The covers of the Underland Chronicles do them no end of disservice. Since my policy is to judge a book by its cover, it took reading The Hunger Games to convince me to pick them up. I had always assumed they would be machine generated chapter books with mythical creatures protecting or seeking some ring or sword, or who knows what, that has some symbolic meaning - or doesn't. Suzanne Collins, however, is in no way machine-generated. She is Dostoyevski for the young-reader crowd. While she uses
...more
I actually got all teary-eyed over the death of an insect. Can you believe it?
A great book, I'm glad I gave it a try although I wasn't sure at the beginning if it would be too young for my taste. Collins has created a fascinating world with the Underland and the book is full of amazing characters (insects and rodents included!).
On to book two! ...more
A great book, I'm glad I gave it a try although I wasn't sure at the beginning if it would be too young for my taste. Collins has created a fascinating world with the Underland and the book is full of amazing characters (insects and rodents included!).
On to book two! ...more
With a few exceptions, I am not typically a big fan of science fiction/fantasy, nor of bugs and rats and dark places. Had I not read and loved The Hunger Games, I never would have even considered reading this book. And I would have most certainly been missing out.
This is Suzanne Collins' first novel, and it is quite a first novel. Gregor the Overlander centers around an eleven-year-old boy and his little sister who fall through a grate in the laundry room of their apartment complex. After being ...more
This is Suzanne Collins' first novel, and it is quite a first novel. Gregor the Overlander centers around an eleven-year-old boy and his little sister who fall through a grate in the laundry room of their apartment complex. After being ...more
I want to give this book so many more than 5 stars. It was SO SO FREAKING GOOD!!! (I pressed the exclamation mark on my phone really hard then just for extra emphasis) :)
Being a book that is intended for younger readers than me, I thought this would just be a fun little read. However in all honesty it had me gripped from beginning to end.
I loved the characters. They had so much more depth than I expected them to. I mean Gregor is an 11 year old kid who has been kind of been forced to be the man ...more
Being a book that is intended for younger readers than me, I thought this would just be a fun little read. However in all honesty it had me gripped from beginning to end.
I loved the characters. They had so much more depth than I expected them to. I mean Gregor is an 11 year old kid who has been kind of been forced to be the man ...more
Well that was sufficiently fantastic. I, naturally, am a HUGE The Hunger Games fan and basically wanted to read this because SUZANNE COLLINS. Obviously my brain had a lot of pressure on this book aaaand...it's very different (obviously) from THG. It's middle-grade. It's an adventure with prophecies and talking animals. And I really enjoyed it!
The characters were adorable. The main character is Gregor (DUH) and he's a fabulous older brother, but he's not perfect. At the same time, though, he didn ...more
The characters were adorable. The main character is Gregor (DUH) and he's a fabulous older brother, but he's not perfect. At the same time, though, he didn ...more
Even though this book has nothing really to do with Kafka, I can't get it out of my head that somewhere in this series is some of the weird Jew from Prague. The cover looks sort of Prague like. There is a main character named Gregor, and there are giant fucking cockroaches in it (must I swear in every children's review I write?).
There has been no real Kafka in the book though. There are some Daddy issues but Kafka doesn't hold the patent on that. Besides looking for Kafka though, I found this f ...more
There has been no real Kafka in the book though. There are some Daddy issues but Kafka doesn't hold the patent on that. Besides looking for Kafka though, I found this f ...more
Oct 02, 2011
Kay
rated it
really liked it
Recommends it for:
spiders and roaches and rats, oh my!
Recommended to Kay by:
just don't fall down any holes in the laundry room
So, my workplace and a few other firms are a part of this program where we got to a local elementary school to read to kids. I was paired up with a fifth grader who loved to read as much as I did. She blew through Breadcrumbs, which was amazing, and we had just started on Gregor the Overlander (Underland Chronicles, #1) when school was dismissed for summer vacation. Me being my usual ADHD self, I left this book unread for months and months while I pursued other books.Now, after reading the enti
...more
Oh, dear! I've read another children's book, haven't I? Well, if I may be so bold, I liked it a lot more than some of the so-called classics. (I'm so immature, but at least I enjoy myself!)
Though I've never really been one for the 'guy gets sucked into another world' kind of genre, this one put a spin on my thoughts. I've not enjoyed a book so much since... well, a long time. It keeps you in such connection with the characters, despite their being fictional. I especially enjoyed how, as the read ...more
Though I've never really been one for the 'guy gets sucked into another world' kind of genre, this one put a spin on my thoughts. I've not enjoyed a book so much since... well, a long time. It keeps you in such connection with the characters, despite their being fictional. I especially enjoyed how, as the read ...more
Well, what do you know? This was one interesting read!
Gregor the Overlander is about a boy who falls down arabbit hole and ends up in the Underland, the world under which is filled with giant cockroaches, bats, rats, and humans who immigrated there some centuries ago.
The Underland sounds very interesting, and I was naturally excited to learn more about this cool land of filth. As a kid I've wondered a lot about "what lives beyond the sewers"? But as an adult Gregor the Overlander lacked a certa ...more
Gregor the Overlander is about a boy who falls down a
The Underland sounds very interesting, and I was naturally excited to learn more about this cool land of filth. As a kid I've wondered a lot about "what lives beyond the sewers"? But as an adult Gregor the Overlander lacked a certa ...more
Before Suzanne Collins became megafamous from writing about The Hunger Games she wrote a wonderful series of children's books called the Underland Chronicles. These were books that I read as a child and very much enjoyed because of the fascinating fantasy world and ideas. I've always liked the idea of world beyond our own fingers or underneath our feet and that is what Collins decided to tackle in these novels.
The basic premise behind this first book is that of Gregor who stumbles down a laundr ...more
This was such a fun MG story! Totally recommend.
The story takes place in New York City. It is about an 11 year old boy named Gregor. He lives in an apartment with his family. He was sad because he couldn't go to summer camp and had to take care of his grandmother and sister. Gregor had to do the laundry and took his little sister, Boots, with him so that he can watch whatever she does. As Gregor was doing the laundry, Boots sees a ball and goes to it. She then fell into this vent and Gregor was worried and went in with her. Gregor was falling
...more
Already an immensely huge fan of Collins, outstanding series The Huger Games, I just had to see what her other books were like.
Now, I've never been particular pleased with rats and cockroaches to begin with, so having to read about life-sized ones was pretty dame creepy let me tell ya, but never the less, the underground world is fantastically imaginative and unique.
I really enjoyed all the characters, Gregor is a heart felt kid and wonderfully good humored and Boots was to precious for words.
B ...more
Now, I've never been particular pleased with rats and cockroaches to begin with, so having to read about life-sized ones was pretty dame creepy let me tell ya, but never the less, the underground world is fantastically imaginative and unique.
I really enjoyed all the characters, Gregor is a heart felt kid and wonderfully good humored and Boots was to precious for words.
B ...more
I loved everything about this middle-grade children's book. It is actually Suzanne Collins' very first novel, pre-Hunger Games. It shares a lot with her more famous trilogy. Fast pacing. An ordinary kid forced by extraordinary circumstances into becoming a leader, a hero. Good good guys and bad bad guys. I already mentioned fast pacing. Gregor, an eleven year old boy and his two year old sister Boots get sucked from the laundry room in their NYC apt building into The Underland. The Underland has
...more
Brought to you by Suzanne Collins – yes – the same Suzanne Collins that wrote The Hunger Games, Gregor the Overlander is a fun and entertaining read. Geared towards younger audiences, the Gregor books are a kind of Alice in Wonderland for boys.
Eleven year old Gregor is stuck babysitting his baby sister Boots. They are in the basement of their apartment building where Gregor is doing their laundry when Boots disappears into an air duct. Gregor follows Boots and falls into another world. They end ...more
Eleven year old Gregor is stuck babysitting his baby sister Boots. They are in the basement of their apartment building where Gregor is doing their laundry when Boots disappears into an air duct. Gregor follows Boots and falls into another world. They end ...more
My 10-yr old son moped around for days after he finished this series because he was so bummed there were no more books left to read. I decided I needed to see for myself what all the fuss was about, and I was also intrigued to see Suzanne Collins' work prior to The Hunger Games. I wasn't disappointed! It is geared towards a younger crowd than Hunger Games, but was still enjoyable for me as an adult. What I really loved is that it has at its core a functional family. Gregor is the hero, but he st
...more
DNF - this book was really a children's book... I picked it up for obvious reasons (SUZANNE COLLINS!) but I didn't really like it. Perhaps I'll give it another shot later, but not now.
...more
this was such a fun surprise! i had thought my fond memories of this series were just nostalgia, but i thought it really held up! it hit the sweet spot of middle grade fiction where it's not too mature for its actual audience but it still has enough underneath the surface for adult enjoyment. iirc the later books only get deeper and cooler but this does a really great job of being a self-contained story while also sowing lots of seeds for the future! i dearly hope suzanne collins writes more boo
...more
A fun adventure story!
aww~~ guys !
I really liked this book!
It's a story about adventures on unknown worlds, about family and love.
At first was really weird, reading about a place where bats, cockroaches, spiders, rats, and all those creepy disgusting things, are part of the "society".
They think, they talk, they feel.. well, I'm not exactly looking forward to have a giant cockroach in front of me.. but you'll get used to picture it throughout the book I guess.
Gregor is a great main character and I really loved Boots. ...more
I really liked this book!
It's a story about adventures on unknown worlds, about family and love.
At first was really weird, reading about a place where bats, cockroaches, spiders, rats, and all those creepy disgusting things, are part of the "society".
They think, they talk, they feel.. well, I'm not exactly looking forward to have a giant cockroach in front of me.. but you'll get used to picture it throughout the book I guess.
Gregor is a great main character and I really loved Boots. ...more
I loved this perfect middle grade read. It was well paced, the characters were all completely engaging, and the hero is just this ordinary kid from New York. Some parts were slightly heavy handed (I'm looking at you, prophecy), but I finished this one with such a feeling of happiness and hope that I couldn't rate it less than 5 stars. A perfect example of what it set out to be.
...more
Sep 26, 2016
Marta
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
borrowed,
read-in-2016
3,5 *
review to come
review to come
Jan 01, 2012
Catherine
rated it
really liked it
Shelves:
coming-of-age,
middle-grades,
2012,
2020,
read-more-than-once,
2013,
fantastical,
audiobook
Although it's been many years since I read it, this book most reminded me of A Wrinkle in Time. Both books concern a family with a missing scientist father (Gregor's father is a Science teacher), but instead of exploring space, Gregor and his toddler sister fall down a chute into a world beneath our own. This world is inhabited by giant bats, rats, spiders, and cockroaches, as well as humans who have lived below ground for many generations. Gregor just wants to get back home, but the Underlander
...more
All 11 year old Gregor wanted to do was to go to Summer Camp. His sister Lizzie got to go, but since his mom has to work, and his grandma has been losing her memory, he has to stay home to watch his 2 year old sister Boots. Since his father went missing a few months back, Gregor has become the man of the household. It is only when him and his sister fall through the grate in their laundry room and end up in an underground wonderland known as the "underland" that their lives are turned upside-dow
...more
Once again I have to say, I'm not big into fantasy, but I fell hard with Boots and Gregor! I finished listening to this one on audio and immediately sought out its sequel Prophecy of Bane; I finished that one and grabbed Curse of the Warmbloods. Now I'm ready for Marks of Secret - but it's not available at my library in audio. I may just have to grab the book and read it myself because I've now seen teasers for Gregor and the Code of Claw (May, 2008).
Gregor is a good one to recommend to readers ...more
Gregor is a good one to recommend to readers ...more
I wasn’t impressed by Suzanne Collins in this pre-The Hunger Games novel, average writing and predictable story, decent fantasy world building but not extra original (even for a middle grade children book). I liked the loving relationship between brother and sister though.
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What's the Name o...: SOLVED. MG Fantasy. Two children on adventure, underground? Cover: large craggy, grey castle, "Greggory"? [s] | 4 | 26 | Feb 16, 2021 12:26PM | |
| What's the Name o...: SOLVED. Fantasy, YA: A series that feels similar to Percy Jackson, A boy falls through the vent in in his laundry room, leading to a fantasy world [s] | 3 | 24 | Dec 10, 2020 01:37PM | |
| What ethnicity is Gregor and his family? | 38 | 379 | Oct 28, 2020 09:25AM | |
| What are your favorite scenes? | 1 | 4 | Jul 14, 2020 10:47AM |
Readers also enjoyed
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
Since 1991, Suzanne Collins has been busy writing for children’s television. She has worked on the staffs of several Nickelodeon shows, including the Emmy-nominated hit Clarissa Explains it All and The Mystery Files of Shelby Woo. For preschool viewers, she penned multiple stories for the Emmy-nominated Little B ...more
Since 1991, Suzanne Collins has been busy writing for children’s television. She has worked on the staffs of several Nickelodeon shows, including the Emmy-nominated hit Clarissa Explains it All and The Mystery Files of Shelby Woo. For preschool viewers, she penned multiple stories for the Emmy-nominated Little B ...more
Other books in the series
Underland Chronicles
(5 books)
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