Survive the Dome

by Kosoko Jackson

Black Lives Matter meets Attack the Block with a dash of Under the Dome in this stunning story of teens using their talents to liberate a city from unjust police occupation

Jamal Lawson just wanted to be a part of something. As an aspiring journalist, he packs up his camera and heads to Baltimore to document a rally protesting police brutality after another Black man is murdered.

But before it even really begins, the city implements a new safety protocol...the Dome. The Dome surrounds the city, forcing those within to subscribe to a total militarized shutdown. No one can get in, and no one can get out.

Alone in a strange place, Jamal doesn't know where to turn...until he meets hacker Marco, who knows more than he lets on, and Catherine, an AWOL basic-training-graduate, whose parents helped build the initial plans for the Dome.

As unrest inside of Baltimore grows throughout the days-long lockdown, Marco, Catherine, and Jamal take the fight directly to the chief of police. But the city is corrupt from the inside out, and it's going to take everything they have to survive.

Genres: Young Adult, Dystopia, Science Fiction, LGBT, Fantasy, Queer, Audiobook

352 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 29, 2022

About the author

Born and raised in the DC Metro Area, Kosoko Jackson has worked in non-profit communications for the past four years. His debut, YESTERDAY IS HISTORY, comes out 2021 by SourcebooksFire.

Reviews

[Kosoko Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

IDK, i think its pretty rad.

[Janae (The Modish Geek) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not going to make this too long because I don't like bashing things I don't like. I didn't enjoy this. I appreciated what Jackson was trying to do, but if this wasn't an eARC, I would've DNF'd it. Keep that in mind.

Five things that kept me from enjoying this book:

1. The main character. Jamal is insufferable, cocky, inconsistent, and self-centered. Being inside of his head was the worst. He waffled so much in his motivations, concerns, actions, and priorities.

2. The dialogue. It was cheesy and heavy-handed. Who's gaze is this for?! It's also repetitive. The amount of times Jamal reminded us that he was a journalist, or described Marco's physicality, or felt like 30 minutes was 2 hours, or bit his tongue and tasted blood was TOO MURCH.

3. Characterization. There was limited personality and depth for anyone. The villians were cartoonish, the side characters had one lane, and all the relationships felt forced.

4. The Dome. This one is on me, but I was expecting more interaction with the Dome and the tech/science behind it. It was basically background noise.

5. The end. Came out of left and felt silly and over-the-top. And I'm sorry, but I know NO Black mother who would've reacted the way Jamal's did.

I hope I'm in the minority on this.

Shout out to SOURCEBOOKS Fire for the eARC.

[Quill&Queer · Rating 4 out of 5]

The bleakest, most realistic dystopian novel I have read, this story is one that I could see becoming reality within a few years, and balances the more futuristic elements with events that we already recognise - Black Lives Matter protests, violent cops and corrupt Governments.

I loved that this book had Queer rep! There's a moment when Jamal reflects on his and Marco's fast connection, and acknowledges that they might have connected faster due to the situation, which felt accurate. There's no insta-love or the like in this story, just two people clinging on to each other during the sheer chaos of the situation.

We never really got a good grip of who the hackers Nemesis were, as they were introduced early on then quickly disappeared before reappearing later. I did feel like I was missing a little something off of the ending, and it did leave room for a potential sequel - I don't yet know if this is a standalone or not.

[kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fast paced, action packed, powerful and brilliantly self aware. The intensity of this book started from page one and continued to build until the last. I really enjoyed Kosoko Jackson’s easy to read and punchy writing style and whilst I do wish the plot and chat ages had been a little more developed (I think stretching it out over a longer period of time would have helped?) overall this was a thrilling contemporary that just so happened to have a few terrifying dystopian elements. Kosoko bought very real life events, truths and atrocities into this story in an uncomfortable, honest, terrifying but ultimately brilliant and engaging. I’m intrigued to see if this continues as a series as the ending definitely left me craving more from the characters and their future. Overall, I was throughly hooked by this book and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it.

TW: racism, racist slur, police brutality

[Paula · Rating 2 out of 5]

Stilted dialogue, a whole lot of plot holes, and if you’re going to use a real city as your setting I feel like you should bother to get the geography, the street names, building types, or the character at least a little bit right.

[Lois · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 Stars
This was just okay for me.

I truly wanted to like this more than I did.

I most definitely will read this authors next novel.

[Maddison Wood · Rating 2 out of 5]

First of all, this was so poorly edited that I felt terrible for the author for having such a shit editor. There were mistakes and typos on almost every page. Sometimes names were even mixed up to the point where I couldn’t follow who was doing what in a scene.

The main problem with this book though is that it should’ve been a sci-fi book but the author clearly tried so hard to make it not a sci-fi book. The concept is cool: a dome that traps a city inside and blacks them out so any kind of riot or protest is quelled before it gains traction. Excellent. Make it chaos inside that dome. Tell me how life would be completely upended and how those people in that dome would have to learn to live and fight and ultimately figure out how to get out. Or maybe someone from the outside figures out how to get in. They use the police’s technology against them, they make everything in the dome backfire on the people that implemented it.

No, instead I read a boring book about an insufferable “I’m a journalist [fart noises]” high schooler who meets 2 people over the course of 324 pages and treats those two people like they’re the closest friends he’s ever had even though he’s only known them for like two days. This world felt so empty and quiet and pointless like the author didn’t know how to put more than 2-4 characters in a scene together. The third act was so boring and unsatisfying, with the last-minute inexplicable deus ex machina of Marco easily being able to hack the police’s super special uniforms to paralyze them. Jamal believing he could actually negotiate with a politician at the end was also insane, as was the book ending with the main characters being offered a job with some hacker organization lmao I’m laughing just writing this. This book literally ended with three teenagers being offered jobs through the GPS in their car.

The police officers were also cartoonishly evil, which is not necessarily far from reality, but it made them seem less threatening. If you’re going to make the police your main villain, don’t make them a straw man. I did like that Jamal outsmarted the police on several occasions, and I kept thinking the author was gonna mention how Malcolm X wrote about that, about how police officers can’t fathom a world where Black people can outsmart them, and so therefore it’s pretty easy to outsmart them. But no, instead this author mentioned Deray McKesson as a misunderstood Black leader LMAO my god dude read the room.

Anyway this book sucks and I hope this author gets a different editor and learns to write sci-fi instead of whatever this is.

[Celia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reasons to read: great plot, character-driven story-line, queer reps

Personal rating: this pro-BLM will resonate with many people and resonating is what I love best!

Jamal, a budding journalist, attends a BLM protest after the police killing of a Black man, hoping his photos will boost his chances of getting into a college of his choice. Not long after arriving does something incredible happen: a giant dome drops on the city, trapping those in and keeping others out save for law enforcement. After an altercation with an officer, Jamal meets Marco and together they navigate the city, keeping out of sight and figuring out a way to hack the dome.

What I liked:

The fast-paced action and tension really drives this novel. Because tech is affected, nobody is able to call for help, so you get the sense that the world beneath the dome is much smaller. And more dangerous.

I have never been to a BLM protest or any protest at all, but I trust that Kosoko knows what he's talking about. I like that Jamal knows what to pack and where to park. I also love that medical stations were set up along with provisions like water etc and it shows you that a lot of protests are very organized and planned well.

The book is rooted in some harsh truths. The compelling idea that someone with power would trap an entire city over a protest isn't too far-fetched and I think it paints an accurate picture of what the "other side" feels about those advocating for the lives of others, like BLM, and gives us a chance to see through someone else's eyes.

What I didn't like:

Jamal was not a very driven character and a lot of the situations he was thrown into really didn't do his character justice. He was saved multiple times and seemed to be a bystander to everything happening rather than someone deeply involved. I understand it takes time for a normal human being to adapt to such a situation, but I expected a bit more agency from him. At times, I thought he was more interested in getting with Marco and admiring his lean form rather than getting out of the city.

Overall, this is a book about fighting for change, and the searing courage it takes to intact such change. It gives me hope that humans will fight back against adversity, even on this grand of a scale.

Love one another. Protect one another. Be brave.

[Rachel Meagher · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't get past the poor dialogue, poor character development, and very poor descriptions of Baltimore.

[charlotte, · Rating 3 out of 5]

On my blog.

Rep: Black gay mc, Black gay li, Latina side character

CWs: police brutality, racism, racial slurs, gun violence

Galley provided by publisher

Survive the Dome is a perfectly decent read, fast-paced, action-packed, with the right balance of realism and idealism to carry off the plot and ending. It was a book I liked, but it wasn’t a book that could beat Jackson’s debut for me.

This is not necessarily a negative thing—I really enjoyed Yesterday Is History, I think in part, because it was a new author and I went in with no expectations. This time, I had expectations. Survive the Dome met them, but it didn’t exceed them.

This is not a subtle story, and of course it doesn’t have to be, but it did lend the story to being somewhat straightforward and predictable. On some level, I was expecting this—it’s pretty clear from the blurb, I think, how it’ll go. So it’s a good thing it’s fast-paced. It’s a book that leans into the thriller aspect of it, which is probably how it should go.

Because, in all honesty, this is not a book with huge amounts of depth and nuance. Again, the latter is something it doesn’t have to have, but I can’t help but think a bit of it might have helped it along. I think there were attempts at nuance, for some of the characters, but it was almost half-hearted. The villains felt almost cartoonish and, given the extent of their plan, how am I really supposed to believe three teens are able to stop it apart from entirely suspending my disbelief?

Despite all of this, though, what I will say is that the main characters are all great. You’ll be rooting for them from the start and, by the end, you’ll want more time with them even after the book is over. That is, to me, the best type of character. Alright, so the romance was a bit instalove-y, but that’s something I can forgive when the characters are this good. That’s what I’ve enjoyed most about Jackson’s books.

So when I say I liked this book, I mean really that its ceiling for me was 3-stars. I liked it. I liked the characters and the pacing, and I overall enjoyed the hours I spent reading it. But not much more.

[Faith Noelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Survive the Dome is a fast-paced, action-packed, sci-fi exploration of police brutality and racism. It stars a queer Black protagonist, Jamal, through whom readers get to explore the difficult questions that come up when we are faced with trying to stay safe while also standing up for what's right. I found the concept of the story really interesting and chilling, and it's almost scary that many will find things in this book all too relatable. I also really liked the way the book indirectly posed a lot of thought-provoking questions. Jamal is in a situation no one would ever expect themselves to be in, and things move so quickly that he has to make decisions without much time, and it gives a good look at the different kinds of decisions people make and why. There were times I felt he had a little too much disregard for his own safety or made decisions I found too rash, but then again, he's a teenager in a high-pressure situation.

I found this book a really quick read. There were some times where the pacing felt a little too rushed to me, but overall there's a lot of good fast-paced action that keeps it exciting. For me the biggest downside is that I didn't get to connect with the characters as much as I wanted to. We get to know Jamal as the protagonist pretty well, but Marco is one of the major characters and I felt like he remained a little too much of a mystery by the end of the story. A lot of side characters come and go without much intrigue, and I just wish there was a little more. That being said, the book's ending sets itself up well for a sequel, so I'm interested to see where this could go.

Notable content warnings: this book does depict heavy violence, police brutality, swearing, and racial slurs. There's definitely heavy material, but it's also nicely balanced with a bit of romance and some fun snarky humor. Also, there's a scene where Jamal tries beer for the first time and hates it, and I related so hard. Let's normalize teens who hate the taste of alcohol and just aren't interested in it! Overall a good read for anyone looking for modern science fiction touching on timely topics.

[Abyssinia · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't enjoy reading this.

Even though the main character is Black, and is protesting the murder of another Black person, there are no other main Black characters in the book.

The main character continously called a Black woman old enough to be his grandmother Jana. And not Ms. Jana.

Lastly, the descriptions were redundant and the story was very unbelievable.

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the way this book started out, as an impenetrable dome settles over Baltimore to trap protesters and keep them from spreading their viewpoints to the rest of the United States. A voice booms out over the city, saying to take cover or suffer the consequences, and 10 minutes later armed police are gunning down civilians in the street.

But that's kind of where my interest in this book began and ended. I was expecting a bloodbath but none of the characters ever seem to be in true danger again. There was no backstabbing, no major character death, no plot twist reveal. The main characters just travel from point A to point B and figure out how to save the day with zero resistance, and then make the world right again and tie up the conclusion with a nifty little bow. I can't tell you how disappointed I was. I was ready for things to get straight-up dystopian and it was all just smooth sailing and got more boring as it went.

[Carrie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was incredibly disappointed by this book. I thought the premise was interesting but unfortunately the execution was subpar at best. If I hadn't read this for school, I would not have finished it. I found it repetitive, didactic, and inconsistent.

While I did agree with the messages of the story, I didn't appreciate being lectured on these topics in every chapter. There was no nuance, no trust in the readers to understand what was going on. It embodied so many of the elements YA gets a bad rap for.

Jamal was constantly reminding us he was a journalist, in case we missed it the first 10 times, with absolutely no real evidence he knew what he was doing.

The writing was awkward and bulky, the main relationship was rushed, and the bad guys were all but twirling their mustaches.

The only reason I am giving this two stars is because I gave Peter Pan 1 star this month and I would feel bad to put them on the same level. At least it had good intentions.

Side note: There also was a character who initially was implied to be a young teen and then when she came back in the story, was implied to be around 6 or 7 years old, based on how she acted and how easily Jamal carried her. Very inconsistent.

[Aly · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars

I'm labeling this 'dystopian', but with all the dissent and terrible things happening in the United States, it doesn't feel like we're that far away from something like a dome. The realness of the story made this a bit hard to read, like a real life horror story. I appreciated that the lead was a gay black man, because that's not a perspective I've experienced and being a minority made this situation even more dangerous.

Though this was a survival story, a couple times this felt a little boring. I know the characters need to take breaks occasionally, but I wanted it to be more edge-of-your-seat intense. I did feel like that police brutality parts were scary and can't imagine being in Jamal's position. I also wasn't sure which characters would survive and got anxious a few times while listening.

The ending seemed a little unrealistic compared to the rest of the book. I didn't think it was bad necessarily, just that it was kind of out of left field and could have been hinted at more throughout the story.

[Ta || bookishbluehead · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really good book. I can’t remember a lot of books that made me so anxious as this one.

Jamal was a great main character. I liked him from the beginning, although I understand why some people may take time to get used to and get to know him. Marco and Catherine were also interesting and likable characters that I enjoyed meeting. I would have loved to get to know more about Nemesis as a group, though.

This story not only made me anxious, it also made me mad. The cops and the government use their power to their own advantage and treat those people as second class. And the atmosphere throughout the whole story was very tense and gripping.

The ending leaves room for a sequel and, personally, I would like to read more about Jamal and his friends.

[Lisa Mandina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the last book I read by this author, Yesterday is History, and was very excited when the publisher sent me a copy of this one to review as well. And this book really hit it out of the ball park!

It was a science fiction story set in a pretty close today time period. The author pulled in all of the police brutality and other types of unrest that people have been feeling more and more lately, as well as in the beginning of the book he included the names of Black people killed by police officers in one town alone, I believe that is what his notes say.

There’s so much to unpack with this one. It’s not only the corrupt police, but also the politicians that are above them, handing down the decisions that make things even worse. The story also takes a look at how police officers may get convicted, but the punishment they receive oftentimes is like a slap on the wrist.

But it’s more than just that. The character reflects on the younger officer that seems to not quite buy in yet to all the things the more seasoned officers just take for granted. And he makes a point about how often the brand new officers don’t have any experience with using a gun, or shooting people, etc. Really he brings up a lot of good points that I never really thought about.

The science of the dome was interesting, what few details we got were enough to keep the story moving without bogging down too much for anyone who might not want all of that. Things happened, like the prison basement, or should I say basement prison, that reflected past moments in history. And in the end, while there was an ending, I like how the author made it more of an open one. Not all loose ends tied up. That’s realistic in my opinion. Not only that, but while I don’t think this is going to be a series, or have a sequel, I could totally see one based on where the characters were at the end.

Another book from this author that I really enjoyed and will be putting on the shelves of the library for my students to read.

Review first posted on Lisa Loves Literature.

[rachel, x · Rating 4 out of 5]

➸ Trigger warnings for racism, anxiety and panic attacks (on-page), graphic police brutality and violence (on-page, theme), attempted murder, gun violence, physical assault, strangulation, electrocution, kidnapping, hostage situation, and false imprisonment.

▷ Representation: Jamal (mc) is Black, gay & has anxiety; Marco (li) is Black & gay: Catherine (sc) is Latina & aroace(?).

Blog • Trigger Warning Database • StoryGraph

[Gina Baker · Rating 1 out of 5]

1 star, DNF. I was really hopeful when picking up this book. The premise is everything I could want. Scifi filled with commentary, a Domed-in Baltimore during a BLM protest. Man, talk about a killer concept and terrible execution.

Technicalities:

Writing/Voice: 1/5
Personal preference, but I hate first person present tense. It's extremely hard for me to relax into the story while reading it. Combine that with stream-of-consciousness style writing, 8.7 billion rhetorical questions, and a complete lack of scene-setting and detail, and holy crap is this a difficult read. There's also less than zero subtlety and an odd number of factoids crammed into the narrative. I think this might've done better as a short story with an accompanying essay, rather than a novel.

Plot: 2/5
They're locked in. Must get out. Three complete strangers meet, trust each other with everything within 24 hours, and their plan is a garbage fire. Haven't completed the book, so no idea how it turns out.

Setting/Worldbuilding: 1/5
There's really no description of Baltimore. It would've been nice to get a feel for a city I haven't had the pleasure to visit. Unfortunately, every description isn't so much a tactile or sensory experience as it is a lecture on everything wrong with the city. A description of a decrepit building is turned into a primer on real estate instead of an experience that shows the problem. Commentary is always welcome, but here it's at the expense of the story, which rips away any deeper impact it may have. The dome is just sort of... there. The scifi elements feel shoehorned in with no explanation. But don't worry, there's a hacker, so they're set.

Characters: 1/5
Jamal is a journalist, and he really, /really/ wants you to know that. Except he's not a journalist. He's a kid with a camera. But no one in the narrative questions him. He says 'I'm here for school. I'm a journalist,' and everyone's just like 'Great, the kid is clearly god's gift to journalism, he will save us'. What? He flip-flops like crazy, in the span of a few pages going from 'I have no reason to trust her' to 'she's given me no reason not to trust her' to 'but can I trust her?' with nothing happening in between. It's extremely hard to live in his head. And that's before the self-aggrandizing and the extreme selfishness. Marco is a hacker. It's mentioned only slightly less often than journalism. And hackers in this world can do literally anything. They're activists, protests organizers, able to bring down technology with a few keystrokes. It's ridiculous. The relationship between Marco and Jamal moves at a lightning pace. There's very little development of either character, but instant trust and an inane amount of back-and-forth questioning that neither tells you anything about the characters nor moves the plot forward. Marco is a non-character, just a list of attractive features. I barely met Cat before giving up, but she's similar. Also, everyone has a ton of confidence, which is pointed out every thirty seconds. Didn't spend much time with the villains, but they were your basic, mustache-twirling evil cops. They could've been made of cardboard.

Editing: 1/5
I think my new method of judging this will be how many 'just's I can find in a 2-page spread. In this case, 3. But honestly, I wish someone had forced the author to use fewer rhetorical questions. It's hard to have a pleasant reading experience while being interrogated. There were also a lot of typos, inconsistencies, echoed phrases. At one point, Jamal and Marco's names were actually mixed up in the scene, making it hard to follow. I don't know who the editor was, but they should be ashamed.

Pacing: 1/5
Everything happens very fast, and not in a way that feels believable or interesting in a crisis situation. It's more boring than frenzied chaos. The same conversations or thoughts are had repeatedly. Cut out all the repetition, and this thing's probably half the size. Maybe as a short, succinct novella, it could've been compelling. But as a novel, the pacing's awful. I reached a little shy of halfway and there wasn't any real drive to move the plot forward.

Overall: DNF. 1 star. Just an unbearable read. Gave up on p. 148/326. Life is too short.

[Starr ❇✌❇ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received an ARC from Edelweiss
TW: racism & police violence, gun violence, strangulation
3.5

Jamal's plan was to attend a peaceful protest, write an article. He wasn't expecting The Dome. Trapped with no one outside aware of what's happening to them, and the the police completely in charge, it's clear this isn't the peaceful holding cell it's been sold as. It's a cage, and it may become a slaughter house.

I do appreciate when speculative fiction leans into that speculative angle, touching our realities enough that what is futuristic almost doesn't seem to be. So I applaud Jackson for this horrific idea that truly sounds possible.
This is also, of course, a very politically relevant book. I can see this sparking interest in real social justice and I can also see this resonating with those who already are aware and invested.

I also my be wrong, but this book seems to set the stage for a potential series of political/activist adventures, and I definitely see how there could be a market for that. This book and potential books like it work well in our current climate.

For me, however, I just didn't get much out of this book. First of all, because Jamal seemed so unrealistic to me. He is, in some ways, aware of what it is to be Black in America- as he should be- and apparently interested in social justice. And he still can't grasp basic ideas and lies to his mom about packing essentials just to bring candy to a protest? He doesn't straddle the line of newly educated or actually, organically a politically aware Black boy well.

This book was also by and large too quick and too over the top for me. While the concept is one that feels relevant and timely, the way it's actually written is too cheesy to strike a real chord. This is also how I feel about the stakes and about the characters, and any growth there may have been in either of those characters gets made impossible by the frantic pacing. I especially dislike the sudden romance for this reason- I don't know either one of them, so not only does the romance feel weird and unrealistic, but I have zero reason to care about.

I think some people will enjoy this book, and it's the right kind of book politically. However, the actual execution was lacking.

[Dana K · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Darkness and pain and hate and anger come slowly, creeping like ivy, and they strangle you, and before long, you're a victim of it like everybody else."

------------------------

Jamal is a high schooler hoping for a journalism scholarship who decides to attend a protest after a cop gets away with killing another black man. Jamal is a little naive and when things get violent at the protest, he hitches himself to a handsome stranger, Marco. Marco tries to help Jamal but gets him tangled in the web of a counter culture group. When they discover Baltimore has been isolated from the rest of the world by a dome until the violence is under control, Jamal is forced to act. He and Marco and another stranger come up with a plan to challenge the chief of police and end martial law to release the dome.

Oof, this one is hard to rate. I liked the concept, although it is appropriated from other dystopian stories (Under the Dome and Hunger Games to name two biggies). The main character is immediately likeable and relatable. As the story goes on though, he becomes quite muddled and it's harder to see his character through the influence of others. He is a good kid wanting to do the right thing while "not betraying his race." I was really surprised by his blind belief and trust in others simply because they had similar skin color, to me this felt very uncomfortable, especially after it bit him in the butt a few times.

There is a ton of action, so if you like a face paced read with lots of violence and an MC that is constantly getting out of scrapes in convenient ways, you will enjoy this one. The science and technology proposed are pretty cool and I liked the hacker aspect of the story.
But, I didn't understand the need to perpetrate the idea that all cops and government officials are "bad" people who never do "good" things and all people of color are "good" even if they choose to do "bad" things. Marco and Jamal have this good people doing bad things conversation many times and it bordered on dangerous to me. The cops in this are atrocious, I wanted more depth on both sides of the colored fence, the reality is much more nuanced. There is not one ally or positive adult role model in this whole thing (except Jamal’s mother who is in it for only a few pages). 

The synopsis does not make it clear how anti-cop the novel is going to be or I may have passed on it altogether. I've read several YA black voices novels that just tackled the subject better and more realistically. That said, it is a dystopian and the threats were meant to loom large, I get that. I think this one could have been a phenomenal commentary on race and policing with fantastical fantasy elements. Instead, I think it was a little messy and heavy handed and it sucked the entertainment out. It's possible to enthrall and teach at the same time without overdoing it, there are so many great examples of that in dystopian novels. I finished it because I was interested in how it would wrap up but I personally wouldn’t recommend this book. Too much hate without hope for my taste.

Thanks to Netgalley for advanced access to this novel. All opinions above are my own.

[Louisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, this was such a fantastic read, I hated the dome, and I loved watching them deal with it! Such a great read!

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jamal heads to a protest for yet another Black person killed by police, planning to take some photos with his analog camera. But when things get heated, the police respond by activating the Dome: a high tech bubble that eliminates electricity and traps the protestors and anyone living in the area inside. Jamal quickly befriends Marco, a hacker who seems to know what's going on, and together they try to find a safe area. But the cops have weaponized suits, and escape from the Dome doesn't seem possible... unless Jamal is willing to join a resistance group called Nemesis to try to take down the Dome and the corrupt government that allowed such a thing to be used.

This story has a high-concept plot, but unfortunately for me I struggled with it. I was expecting more of a futuristic, dystopian story, and this was far too real. I wouldn't be surprised if something like this actually happened. I recently read another book involving a dome (this one using magic) and teens fighting for survival, so maybe it was that I was tired of the concept as well? Jamal was an interesting character, I'm always partial to characters who love photography, and while his drive for journalism and his analog camera came into play, I didn't quite feel like the photography element was utilized throughout. The way Jamal found the USB also seemed a bit deus ex machina. Of course, the book does have a powerful message about whose lives matter and who the government is willing to sacrifice for peace (or obedience).

[Karen Barber · Rating 4 out of 5]

Survive the Dome is a fast-paced story, forcing us to confront our ideas about direct action and the role of the police.
Our main character is aspiring journalist, Jamal, who is determined to head to Baltimore to chronicle the protests taking place over the killing of a black man by a police officer. Drawing heavily on events of the last year (and, I’m fairly sure, the continuing reality for many) the upset and hurt caused by such events is palpable. As a young black man Jamal is all too aware of the risks he’s taking in attending the protest, but he is determined to stand up to the things he sees as wrong.
Unfortunately, the protest coincides with a truly terrifying advancement in public order. The Governor has initiated a device called The Dome which effectively isolates any community it is placed over, allowing those in control to do as they please in order to keep the peace. While this might seem a device with possibilities, when it is being used to perpetuate racist ideologies we can see just how scary it is.
So it falls to Jamal and the teens he encounters during the course of his experience to try and take down the Dome.
From start to finish this blends contemporary issues with disturbing scientific ideas. Those Jamal is up against are horribly plausible in some ways, though there’s a fair number of unpleasant characters along the way. Everything seems to fall into place remarkably easily when you review the book in its entirety, but the ending hints that Jackson might not yet be finished with these characters. My only real bugbear was the romance element which bubbled along throughout but which didn’t really (for me) offer much to the story.
I’m grateful to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this before publication in exchange for my honest thoughts.

[Steve DuBois · Rating 2 out of 5]

THIS POST CONTAINS MANY, MANY SPOILERS

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In 2024, American police killed 20 unarmed black men. That’s twenty too many. Representatives of the state should meet a higher, rather than a lower, standard with respect to application of force. All forms of qualified immunity should be abolished and law enforcement officers should be monitored at all times, and held accountable in all ways, for violence against members of the community.

Literature about the problem of state violence is important. Because it is important, it, too, should be held to a high standard. There has been excellent YA produced that covers this ground, with The Hate You Give as one prominent example. Survive The Dome by Kosoko Jackson attempts to grapple with the issue, but ultimately fails due to its Manichean outlook and its many, many plot holes.

Jackson is a competent writer. He succeeds, to some extent, in telling a story. My favorite scene in the book is the scene in which Jamal and Marco share a bed for the first time. When he presents the reader with fully realized human beings engaging with one another, he's fine.

The first of the book’s problems is that it rarely presents fully realized human beings engaging with one another. Solzhenitsyn wrote that “The line separating good and evil passes…right through every human heart. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained.” Jackson isn’t buying what Solzhenitsyn is selling. The world of Survive the Dome is defined by the intersectional progressive belief that membership in a disadvantaged group is synonymous with character; the repressed have no impure motives, and those in privileged groups are motivated purely by malice.

Setting aside the fact that this ideology breeds hatred, it produces boring fiction. You don’t need to spend any time while reading Survive The Dome wondering whether a character will surprise or disappoint you. The moment you hear the character’s skin tone described, you know whether you are dealing with a hero or a villain. Nor are you going to run into any moments where you question the motives of the heroes or feel a pang of understanding for the villains. It’s all very much black and white, with the villains delivering Bond-villain soliloquies in which they roll around in their racism, and the heroes voicing college dorm-room tropes about the sheer nobility of the victimized underclass. In the book’s cringiest scene, we get to watch a fearless Latina (or, as Jackson insists, Latinx) dish out a beatdown on a combat-suited cop while simultaneously delivering a lecture on privilege.

It is difficult, but not impossible, to produce a good novel this way. I’ve read ideological polemics that work as entertaining fiction. But to make that happen, you’ve got to be a heck of a storyteller with a masterful sense of plot mechanics. The story has to happen in a world with well-defined rules and with characters who act according to their own nature within the scope of those rules. This is the second problem with Survive The Dome. Over and over again, both heroes and villains behave in ways that are, at best, tactically stupid, and at worst, utterly inconsistent with the motives attributed to them.

I contend that the plot is the book’s primary problem. To defend this claim, I must describe the plot. So here come the spoilers, by the truckload.

Let’s talk about the imbecilic character behavior that drives the plot of this book.

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1. GOVERNOR AMBROSE, AMERICA'S STUPIDEST POLITICIAN.

Ms. Ambrose is the venomously ambitious and politically conservative governor of Maryland. In that role, she inherits a experimental military technology program dating back to the 1980s and brings it to fruition. It is an astonishing achievement; what her program achieves is nothing less than world-changing in military terms. Not only is it possible to create a physically impenetrable force field the effectiveness of which is not reduced when it is scaled up to encompass an entire American city, it can also be scaled down to power individual combat suits which turn the wearers into de facto super soldiers, with video links accessible to every combatant, ensuring perfect tactical coordination across the entire field of battle.

Governor Ambrose is looking to win votes in (presumably) the Republican presidential primaries. Kinda seems like providing this tech to the US military would achieve that, don’t you think? If nothing else, leasing it to them would provide her with an inexhaustible campaign war chest. How would voters respond to, for instance, an impenetrable shield protecting civilians from missiles?

Of her many political options, the Governor chooses to use the tech to imprison the population of Baltimore’s poorer neighborhoods inside a translucent and, presumably, oxygen-permeable dome. Her scheme, as explained in her Bond-villain monologue, is to show the voters a method of conflict management that will insulate peacekeepers from harm. The selling point--and she makes this absolutely explicit in her dialogue with our plucky teen heroes--is that it protects soldiers and law enforcement personnel. The dome ensures that disreputable and violent elements can be isolated, and that no soldiers or law enforcement officers will have to be put at risk to keep the scofflaws at bay.

A couple of the scientists on the project have reservations about the whole business, and very intelligently complain to their bosses instead of going straight to the media. Governor Ambrose “disappears” them but, in keeping with a trend that recurs throughout the novel, unaccountably leaves them alive.

She then puts the dome up over Baltimore…with the police inside it, wearing the super-suits. The upside of this, politically, is that she gets to produce carefully edited videos of the cops kicking ass on those Awful People of Color. Needless to say, this does NOT fit with her rationale of protecting cops and soldiers. Perhaps she was lying to our plucky teen heroes?

Not only are the peacekeepers in harm’s way, they get harmed. Indeed, the Chief of Police (and we’ll get to him later, BOY, will we get to him) manages to get himself taken hostage by our plucky teen heroes. And once they have their hostage, they have him call the Governor to come negotiate him out of there.

What is the Governor’s incentive to agree to this demand? Why does she not simply hang up the phone? If she blows them off and they kill their hostage, her experiment has demonstrated EXACTLY what she wanted it to—that the scruffy urban types must be put in their place and that isolation is the best method of doing so.

Or: she could go in the opposite direction; she could use the seizure of the Chief of Police as a causus belli. The scruffy urban types have gone too far this time! Send in the National Guard! And support the politician who’s tough on crime, you Republican primary voters!

Nope. She negotiates. And not at a distance. She elects to travel into the dome and confront the armed bunch with a penchant for seizing important white people as hostages PERSONALLY, backed not by an entire division of US marines, but by a small security detail.

The plucky heroes threaten to kill their hostage. This is a strange choice. If they do in fact kill him, Governor Ambrose can have her security detail gun them down, and then use the Chief as a martyr for her cause. “I put myself in harms way, but these terrorists wouldn’t listen to reason. Honor the memory of Chief Coles! Support me in my crusade to keep our streets safe.”

Rather than take this route, Governor Ambrose negotiates. And by "negotiates", I mean she folds like a cheap card table. She concedes to a list of demands that include the dismantling of the dome and her own resignation from office. Why does she do this? The novel gives us two reasons. First: the plucky heroes threaten to release a video taken from the cameras of the super-soldier cops documenting their abuses of people of color. Second, our plucky teen heroes give her an "out" of sorts; she can blame the whole thing on Chief Coles, extricate herself from the whole affair, and pursue higher office on her own terms.

I think you can see the problem with presenting these two arguments in tandem.

The "out" that our plucky teen heroes are giving the Governor is a good one. In fact, it is so good that it completely destroys negates their leverage. “You’re right,” Governor Ambrose could say, “I could blame Chief Coles for this whole thing...including all the stuff in that video I'm supposed to be scared of. You know what? Publish and be damned, kiddos. I’m gonna take your advice and tell the public a story about a police chief gone rogue. In fact, by crikey, that’s another reason why we need the dome! Not just to isolate criminals—but to avoid exactly this kind of interaction between the cops and the criminals that your video displays. Deal’s off, kids. I’m outta here; gotta measure some curtains for the Oval Office.”

She doesn’t say this. Nor does she notice that she gains nothing by conceding. Even if she gives them everything they want, it’s not like they’re handing her a set of photographic negatives or something. They could have a dozen copies of those video files, or a hundred, to release to the media at any point they wish.

Governor Ambrose folds. She gives the kids everything they want and lets them walk away scot free. The dome goes down. The good guys celebrate.

If Governor Ambrose has the tactical intelligence or political vision of an eight-year-old, the plucky heroes lose, and she walks away with everything she wants.


2. NEMESIS: WHAT ANONYMOUS WOULD BE IF EVERY MEMBER HAD A BRAIN INJURY

Nemesis, who are mostly aligned with the good guys, is a collection of hackers descended from Anonymous. It is a strange line of descent and there are suggestions of serious inbreeding.
Nemesis is a secret organization. Very, very secret. So secret, in fact, that its members have tattoos of the organization’s crest in clearly visible areas such as their faces. So secret that they emblazon the organization’s logo on the door of their ultra-secret safe house.

Nemesis is also very, very wary of its public image—a rare trait, one might think, in a secret society, but I suppose we all have our quirks. They cannot be seen as criminals! In order to avoid any such impression, they deny membership to any prospect who has a criminal record. Because, you know, otherwise the public might check their membership lists and do some digging and discover that one of their members had done bad things.

Anyway, this secret society of 1337 uber-haxxors gains advance warning of the pending attempt to isolate urban Baltimore behind a forcefield, and in accordance with their profound aversion to being seen as criminals, they decide to directly confront the police and government and take the whole thing down.

Do they do this by, for instance, revealing the documents they’ve obtained about this pending plot to the media? They do not.

Do they, in accordance with their profound concern for social justice, inform the black and brown citizens of Baltimore of the pending attempt to imprison and beat seven colors of shit out of them? They do not.

No. What Nemesis does is this. They move what appears to be their entire membership inside the area which is going to be Domed, where all the cops are, so they can take it down from the inside.

Do they put any of their members--like, EVEN ONE of their members--OUTSIDE the dome, so they can, you know, try to take it down from the OTHER side, where the cops AREN’T? If you’re asking these questions, that just goes to show that you are NOT a 1337 uber-haxxor like Nemesis. Anyway, the cops raid their super-secret hideout with their logo on the door and take them all into custody, and it’s hard to argue that they deserve better.


3. CHIEF COLES: AMERICA'S DUMBEST COP, AND POSSIBLY AMERICA'S SINGLE STUPIDEST HUMAN BEING.

Where do we even BEGIN with this guy?

Police Chief Coles is a piece of work. The author says he’s widely seen as “charming,” which I suppose is Jackson’s way of saying something about how the media softens cops’ public perceptions, given that every time we see him he’s delivering moustache-twirling evil rants and basically cackling with malicious glee.

Anyway, Chief Coles and his entire police force are suited up and ready to roll when the dome comes down—not one single member of the conspiracy lets the word slip, either through moral reservations or just a desire to jabber about their pending trip to Robocop Fantasy Camp--and being inveterate racists to a man, they immediately start beating the asses of every person of color they see and saying every racist thing that comes into their heads.

The basic techniques of real-world policing appear to have been abandoned under Chief Coles’ leadership. For instance: we do see the police patrol in partnerships at times. But whenever a situation of genuine danger arises, as when Super Racist Officer Lewis tracks down the plucky heroes, there’s no partner to be seen and no attempt to call in backup. Nor, one supposes, is anyone actually monitoring these video feeds which allow everybody to see what any officer is seeing, because when Officer Lewis gets into that fight I mentioned earlier, where he gets his ass kicked by an unarmed woman who lectures him about privilege throughout, there’s no swarm of cops descending from all directions in response to his video feed. Then, when Officer Lewis’s partner retraces his steps to the plucky hero hideaway and goes in to find out what happened to him, he TOO goes in alone, rather than backed up by about four hundred other cops. One is reminded of those old martial arts movies in which dozens of ninjas attack Bruce Lee one at a time so he can take them each out in succession.

As was mentioned in the Nemesis section above, Chief Coles is able to defeat Nemesis’s impeccable security and take them into custody, and he manages to bust Jamal and Marco into the bargain. He wants info from Jamal about their network, and so he does what evil cops do and has his henchmen beat the ever-loving shit out of Jamal’s love interest. Poor Jamal caves and gives up everything.

At this point Chief Coles has decided he wants to turn Jamal into an informant. He knows exactly what he needs to do to keep Jamal in line. He’s used Marco as leverage, and it worked. So: does he keep Marco in custody as insurance against Jamal going rogue? Nope. He just decides he’ll turn Marco loose as well, because reasons.

Does Chief Coles put a tracking device on Jamal or Marco in order to see where they go from that point forward and whom they interact with? Don’t be silly. That would imply that he doesn’t trust the two of them or something. Far wiser to just let them roam free and keep the door open for Jamal in the hope that he’ll see the light. You know, having seen his boyfriend tortured in front of him and everything, he’s surely got every reason to want to cross the line and serve the state.

And what happens at this point…I still can’t quite believe I read it.

Sure enough, Jamal contacts Chief Coles. He’s got INFORMATION! It’s time for Chief Coles to reap the benefits of his faith in young people!

Does Chief Coles send an officer to meet with Jamal at an agreed upon location? Don’t be ridiculous. Clearly, a show of faith is required here. Nothing will do but to invite the kid to his mansion, to be wined and dined in preparation for The Spilling of the Beans. I mean, that’s how police interact with their informers in the real world, right? Bring ‘em out to the burbs for a BBQ. Common practice, really.

Now.

Chief Coles has, in his possession, a USB drive. On this USB drive he has copies of all of the documentation relating to the design and operations of those super-suits his cops are wearing.

Why has he created this USB drive? What conceivable purpose could it serve? Even if you must keep the files around, why in hold hell would you store it one portable media, which anyone at all could just pick up and sort through? Because...reasons.

But…surely, he keeps it in a secure location, right? Like, at City Hall? Or at Police HQ, surrounded by cops? At the bottom of a locked filing cabinet in a disused lavatory marked with a sign reading “Beware Of The Leopard?” There’s no reason to take any chances at all with it, right?

Chief Coles keeps this USB drive in his home. In a secret study, without a police officer in sight. Hidden inside a hollowed-out book, on a bookshelf. And the book in question is left sticking out of the stack. Because…I dunno, maybe the Feng Shui is better that way?

Jamal comes into Chief Coles’ home. He takes a bath and eats a meal and he “spills the beans”. Chief Coles has his informant! The kids really are all right. And now, Chief Coles decides to reward his informant, to show Jamal the benefits of loyalty.

So Chief Coles lets Jamal make a phone call, to anyone he wants, outside the dome.

From what location does Jamal get to make this phone call?

Not from a monitored cell phone set up specifically for the purpose. Not from the living room, or an upstairs bedroom, or an office, or the pantry. Not from the kitchen or the billiard room or the conservatory. No. Chief Coles elects to usher Jamal into his secret study, where the all-important USB drive is barely hidden, to make the phone call.

At which point, CHIEF COLES LEAVES THE ROOM.

HE WALKS OUT OF THE ROOM. HE LEAVES JAMAL UNATTENDED, IN THE ROOM WITH THE USB DRIVE. FOR FIVE MINUTES. SO THAT JAMAL CAN MAKE HIS PHONE CALL IN PRIVACY.

YOU’LL NEVER GUESS WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

Later on, we’ll watch Chief Coles put himself on the front line of a confrontation with the demonstrators; the contents of the USB will lead to his capture, and to the bizarre negotiation with Governor Ambrose that I mentioned above. And some might say that getting captured constitutes a stupid move on Chief Coles’ part. But…after the bit with the phone call…I mean, really, it’s all small potatoes from that point on.

They could reveal that Chief Coles personally invented the force field tech and the super suits, Tony Stark style, and he would still go down as one of the dumbest characters in the history of American fiction.

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Wow. That went on a while, didn’t it? This ended up being a much longer review than I intended to write, but I do think it’s necessary for me to fully justify my rating here.

Books can make a difference. We really do need books about abuse of police power. But Survive the Dome is absolutely not the book we need.

[Heather Horror Hellion · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gave me horrible anxiety.
It is definitely one of those books you read and think these things could happen.

The characters in the book were written so well that I got out of breath running from the cops with them. Everytime there was an interaction with law enforcement I knew one of my favorite characters was going to die. Did that happen? I'm not going to tell you because that would be a spoiler.

I definitely have had some of the same thoughts as the character like maybe I shouldn't wear my hoodie at night, don't look suspicious, if an officer talks to you keep your answers short.

This book is fast paced and I really suggest you pick it up if you want to raise your anxiety.

[Sal · Rating 2 out of 5]

Popsugar Reading Challenge: 2022 release

There was nothing specifically terrible about this book, it just fell flat in so many areas that I was just left feeling cold on the whole thing.

1) The plot. I think it made sense in premise and had tie ins with reality that made the stakes feel real. But the execution just didn't really make sense to me. This hacker group organised a protest despite knowing of the government plans for the dome thus ensuring that MORE people would be trapped in the dome??? People that didn't live in Baltimore were trapped there which means there would be hundreds of families and friends kicking up a stink about their missing loved ones and it's just impossible to believe everyone would go ignored. Even if they somehow managed to make it lawful within Baltimore it would not be considered lawful elsewhere.

2) The characters. They all felt very one note. Jamal was fine but also made some bizarre decisions that often contradicted in such a way that made it difficult to get a good read on his character. He mentioned that he was a journalist and queer and black about 50 times each but who is he beyond these labels? I'm not really sure. At times he seems naïve, other times practical and worldly. Either is fine but consistency is preferred. Catherine and Marco too felt very one dimensional.

3) The relationships. I am quite content with the fact that bonds would be forged quickly under these circumstances however I felt there was a level of familiarity that just couldn't exist. For example at one point Jamal thought "Oh that's so Catherine." But he's known this girl for two days so he can't really have a good understanding of what that could mean. There was several examples of this where Jamal would make statements about these total strangers as if they had all this shared history that just isn't there. Also the romance just distracted from the plot rather than feeling well integrated into it.

4) The "Bad Guy". The motivations of the overall mastermind were not very clear to me. I understood the purpose of the dome but where are we going from there? How? Why. Why is every single cop an evil caricature. Just having one cop express some kind of doubt or discomfort could have helped them feel more human.

The ideas were there but this just needed another layer of polish applied.

[Lala Rochelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written. Nice pace. New favorite author. Loved the main character Jamal. He was relatable. He made decisions that I think most ppl would make if they were in that situation. I loved it.

[Jay DeMoir · Rating 2 out of 5]

The concept was cool: a dome that traps a city inside and blacks them out so any kind of riot or protest is supposedly quelled before it gains traction. Excellent. Make it chaos inside that dome. But that's not what this was. It was less hunger games and very disappointing.
The main character constantly reminds us he's a teen journalist, he meets 2 people and there's clear trauma bonding where he puts them before himself, and it's just very...mediocre. There were dozens of "I taste my blood" inserts and it quickly became a repetitive tale that pales in comparison to other stories of this genre like The Hate U Give and Tyler Johnson Was Here...

:-(

[Dayla · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was rough and very, very open about its main theme: Police brutality.

I highly recommend you read any TWs because this definitely touches on the subject of racism, racial profiling, and police brutality towards minorities.

The reason why I'm not giving this a higher rating is because there were some instances where my brain just lost interest because beyond the topic mentioned above, this book didn't really follow the path I thought it would. I wasn't the biggest fan of the MC, but I understood why he made the decisions he made.

My rating is also not a bad one. I enjoyed this one for the most part and I think it can be a unique way of looking at the brutality experienced by so many at the hands of the police. What I liked about this book too was how it discussed that this topic often--if not always--extends beyond just the police. Those in charge above the police also have the power to make a change but like in this book, they choose either not to make a change or make things worse.

The concept of this book was really cool, but I don't really think it lived up to its full potential. While I enjoyed the book, I think it could have been even better. But I definitely recommend it because of the important and jarring topics it explores!

Happy reading!