The last part of the Metro trilogy is a very uneven for me.

I'll try to show why I don't like Metro 2035 and why I think that it is a great book for school reading.

WARNING: this review can contain spoilers so if You don't want to know about the final chapter of original Metro trilogy then please leave this page.

Why I'm in love with Metro universe

Many of You maybe already know, that I'm a big fan of Alien movies. Claustrophobic, dense atmosphere of terror and of the unknown being is something what I really like in movies and books.

And that sentence is what Metro serie used to be - but I can't say the same thing about the 3rd part of it.

A science-fiction thiller story was replaced by sensational, political-fiction thing.

In my opinion this book is more similiar to another Glukhovsky's book - FUTU.RE.

I wanted to read a sci-fi story, packed with action and filled with post-nuclear creatures and mutants. I think in the whole book there is not even single monster (I don't count disorted/deformed people living in metro).

This fact makes me very disappointed about this book.

Why Metro 2035 should be a school reading?

Because it is an interesting story. Because it's pretty brutal. Because there's very gross scenes. Because it shows the worst parts of human beings.

Because it shows how the things world really works.

Because it will prepare teenagers for their adult life.

What hit me most in the Metro 2035 book? It's relativity to current world state.

Just think about it - we can divide people into several classes:

• Multi-billionaire who have the most influence on the shape of the world around us,

• Middle-class, who want to ingratiate upper class,

• Lower-class, who just accept the world as it is and don't do anything more.

And that's how Metro 2035 shows it: there are Observers - most powerful class, which members live in the shadows of the metro (or even metro-2 but in abundance). They control everyone and everything.

Then we have various metro station managers, who will even sell own (or innocent people ones) soul to the devil, just to showoff in the front of their superiors.

We have also regular metro population - people who live in metro and don't care much about anything more - they work hard, starve, are sick, kill others, die. They don't think about leaving the metro (even if it's really possible and moderately safe) - they just get used to live there and don't want to change anything.

And finally the last, but not least group are idealists. They don't accept how everything works and want to make change. Unfortunately, they realise that without proper connections and clout they cannot do anything.

Young people tend to live the dream and want to change the world. Unluckily, very few of them are successful with that.

The entry into adult life can be very painful. Young idealistic minds very often are not prepared for this. In various life situations they will find that they're not masters of the world but pretty helpless beings (which is very often caused by their company/country superiors/politics/you name it).

This is very pessimistic - so why teenagers should read it?

Because the whole metro structure can be a very good material for discussion. Teenagers could speak openly how they see references to current world state or actual events.

On the other hand, teachers can (gently) tell teens how the things work, visualise their points of view about adult world mechanics.

Summary

Metro 2035 can be pretty depressing and hard. But is life actually easy?

Sometimes it is.

Sometimes not necessarily.

Metro 2035 is a very good book, with realistic story and strong, well developed side-plots and characters.

If You're looking for something like Metro 2033 - You'll barely find it here. If You've read FUTU.RE and like it - then this book is for You.

Happy reading!

-- ł.