Shipbreaker was a book read for my school's book club and recommended to the group by your's truly. It was something I had had on my radar for a long time. Two of my most beloved authors, Rick Riordan and Maggie Stiefvater, both gave it a fair amount of praise and the premise intrigued me. The book got mixed feelings at the meeting, but for me, not sure what to expect going in, it was great! The world was fresh and the internal battle of the main character between loyalty to family and loyalty to friends had great depth and drove the plot.

Shipbreaker takes place in the future, following great flooding of the coasts around New Orleans and the Central Americas. Nailer, a young teenager who lives in the Gulf Coast, works with his crew to scavenge materials from old oil tankers that have washed ashore. His father, a drunk and drug addicted man, beats him while he deals with the pressure of growing older and no longer being able to perform the same scavenging as he did when he was smaller. One day, following a hurricane, he finds a shiny new clipper shipwrecked on the coast and a young girl unconscious inside. He quickly faces the struggle of helping himself or helping the strange girl.

As I said earlier, the world building involved in this novel is exquisite. It feels as though Bacigalupi plotted out every little detail of the way the word worked but only revealed half of what he created with the audience. There were constant hints to more, more of this world that we would never get to see. Each person, place, or thing that is mentioned only once creates and even richer environment for the characters to grow in.

There were constant references to this great flooding that took place in New Orleans and when the characters visit the city built to replace it, their train passes over the remains of New Orleans. We never really find out much about this flood but the characters speak about it every now and then. As readers, we don't really know anything about this event, but since the characters treat it as a well-known fact, it feels like a natural part of the world's history. The same thing happens with their religion. There are many instances when the characters bring up the spirits that grant them luck. We don't get the chance to learn much of anything about their religious beliefs beyond that, yet this religion comes naturally with the world. It's so easy to accept that you don't yearn to know more about their religion because you don't feel as though you need to know any more. The way Bacigalupi weaves these hints of world building into his storytelling makes this future seem like a real place and time.

Since this book does take place in the future, it's also interesting to look at how Bacigalupi brings the futuristic aspect to the world. I'm going to be honest, as embarrassing as it is, and admit that when I started this book I forgot it took place in a future time. For a long while I was reading this book as though it were realistic fiction. So when Nailer started talking about half-men, I wasn't really sure what to think. Originally, I thought perhaps it was just a term used for large, brutish men like Mountain Ox from The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin. Big biceps, small brains. The muscle that villains always have around. And then I found out that they're literally half man. Lab grown, human, dog, and tiger hybrids, these men are basically bred to be desire-less servants. It was an interesting shock as a reader, but it brought an interesting aspect to the story and introduced my favorite character, Tool. A half-man who decides to defy his "owner" and help Nailer with his struggles, he proved to be an influential addition to the work. To me, he was a character I related to because he was all about defying expectations. This futuristic world that he came from expected him to bend to the will of others but he chooses his own path and isn't afraid to let that world know it. I found this to be a short, albeit strong, underlying message in this novel. The follow up novel, The Drowned Cities, revolves around Tool, which instantly proves the impact he has.

Nailer also faces internal struggles. They are not so much about defining who he is but rather about how he views right and wrong and his struggles to decide what truly is right. Greed is on the forefront of this internal challenge for him. The life Nailer lives on the beach, scavenging for scrap, isn't the life of luxury. Everyone on the beach desires to be like Lucky Strike, a man who got rich quick when he came upon an oil cache in a tanker. The society that Nailer lives in is constantly asking for luck like him to rid themselves of the hunger and poverty that come with their lives. When Nailer discovers the clipper following the storm, he initially believes that he's hit it big like Lucky Strike. The oil in the ship, let alone the jewelry and gold that the owners of the ship possessed, would be able to turn him into a rich  man overnight. What I loved about this novel is that when Nailer discovers that Nita, the rich girl he discovers on the boat, is still alive, he doesn't instantly become a hero and strive to help her. Throughout the entire book he is questioning if it would be easier to simply take the wealth and abandon her. This is such a human characteristic and seeing it laid out so plainly for me made Nailer seem real. He didn't make a cheesy, "I have to help my fellow man", quick decision the minute he saw that she was alive and possibly in a lot of trouble with the other beach dwellers. He thought about himself first and how this could benefit him, and it takes a whole novel's worth of growth before we see where he falls in helping himself or helping others.

Helping himself isn't the only struggle he faces internally. He also faces his father and how the wealth of the clipper could benefit his as well. It's clear that the relationship between father and son is not at its best. Nailer openly admits to the fact that his dad beats him. Now, as Nailer contemplates whether or not to take the riches from the boat, he has his father's desires lurking over him. Nailer's struggle with greed is not dangerous to him, but his father is. A decision that angers his father could be the last one he makes. This makes Nailer's internal debate about helping Nita all the more intriguing. He has to decide whether to help his father as well as himself. The constant tension amid the family spans the entire novel and strings along drama, action, and suspense. Nailer begins to question what his definition of family is and who he should be trying to help, an abusive father who is his blood or his friends who take him in like family.

I believe this book deserves all of the praise it has received, which includes the Micheal L. Printz award in 2011. There is action, drama, and love all tied together with lessons about family, decisions, and growing up. The world that is built around this story is beautiful all by itself and alone makes the novel worth reading I think everyone can find something to enjoy and something to relate to. Despite what the book club says, I would recommend this book again. A lovely and original read.