Reviews

Following a terrible car crash, Eva, 14, awakens from a strange dream and finds herself in a hospital bed. Medical science, in this book's future setting, has allowed doctors to pull her functioning brain from her crushed body and put it into the able body of a chimpanzee. With the aid of a voice synthesizer, she communicates with others and adjusts to her new body; because her father is a scientist who has always worked among the chimps (who have been crowded by the massive human population out of any semblance of a natural world, and into iron and steel jungles), Eva is comfortable with her new self. She takes on the issue of animal rights, setting up (with the help of others, of course) an elaborate scheme to release chimps back into the last of the wild. Years later, that is where she dies. The story is riveting from the outset, especially as Dickinson details the ways in which Eva's life is saved, and the progress of her recovery. As the story becomes more political, the author loses sight of some compelling questions he has sewn into the opening pages: Who owns her--the chimp's owner, her parents, herself? Eva's human aspect becomes a device that allows her to help other chimps survive, but is otherwise unquestioned. The drama is no less suspenseful for that, but it is less satisfying. Ages 12-16. (Apr.)

Gr 8-12-- Set in the overcrowded world of the future, Eva is an excellent science fiction/fantasy story with a strong heroine and well-drawn supporting cast. Eva, 13, is in an irreversible coma after a car accident. In a previously untried procedure, scientists transfer her memory and brain patterns to a new body--that of a chimpanzee, Kelly. Kelly's instincts and subconscious memories stay with Eva. The problems that arise as Eva/Kelly adapts to her new body and feelings and as people adapt to her as a new entity make an intriguing story line. Eva eventually goes to live as a chimpanzee on an experimental island devoid of mankind. Whether her introduction of human knowledge to the chimps will produce a new species is hinted at but not confirmed. The adults and the chimps in Eva's life are secondary characters but not without impact. Each chimp has a definite personality. The eerie tone that is set early is not sustained throughout the book, but the compelling need to know what happens to Eva/Kelly will keep readers captivated to the end. A well-written, entertaining look into the future. --Kathryn Havris, Mesa Public Library, Ariz.