Is the character in your book, easy to relate to?

A lot of elements come into play to make a book engaging. In particular, the character(s) are the most elements that will engage the reader or perhaps not.

We were nearing the climax in the book Ungifted by Gordon Korman. The book ended, but seeing that there were more pages left, we decided to flip to the next page out of curiosity. What we found was the excerpt of the sequel to this book, Supergifted. My reading companions were pleasantly surprised and were keen that we read the sequel too. It almost felt that the heavy feeling that hung in the air a couple of minutes ago since the book had ended, almost vanished instantly. There was more to read after all in the same story!

We read the blurb and a part of the excerpt. We learnt about how one of the interesting characters in Ungifted had managed to succeed in his plan. The character in question is Noah Youkillis who seems to intrigue the readers each time we read about him. Recently we had a discussion about him and the other important character, Donavan Curtis. The two are friends but they are pretty much opposite of each other. Donavan Curtis is a smart but above average student who loves to have fun. He is used to landing in tricky situations and pulling himself out of them. Noah Youkillis on the other hand is brilliant. He is a genius with an IQ over 200. Every academic subject comes to him easily. He doesn't find that exciting. He wants to fail. He wants to perform badly so that he has something to aspire for, work towards. Someone who is likely to be envied by any other student for excelling in any academic subject without much effort, wants to have what any other student has. Which is the need to work hard to get a good grade. Ironic isn't it?

Comparing the two of them.

We tried to understand both characters in as much detail as possible. Many young readers said that they have known people like Donovan Curtis. But not Nova Youkillis. This character intrigues them. From a plot point of view one easy to relate character and another character who is so rare, someone who makes you pause to think. The killer combination has kept the young readers tuned into Supergifted. Stay tuned for more updates from us, in which we will share our newer and upcoming experiences with this book.

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