This books takes place in New York, where an 11-year-old boy named Gregor lives with his working mother, his bedridden grandmother, and her two sisters, Boots and Lizzie. Gregor stays at home and takes care of his grandmother and his sister, a 2-year-old Boots, after his father mysteriously disappears. As he goes to the laundry room to pick up his clothes, Boots falls down an old air duct leading to the Underland, leaving Gregor no choice but to fall with her. When he gets there, he finds that the Underlanders have awaited for an Overlander to arrive and fulfill a prophecy that has hung over their heads for years. Gregor tries to escape to the Overland, but loses interest once he realizes that his father is being kept hostage by the enemies, which motivates him to go on a quest to fulfill his prophecy and save his dad.

            Gregor the Overlander is a fantasy novel I personally really enjoyed due to the whole pacing of the journey. It felt dry or that it was just filler. Everything written in the novel felt like it added to the story in a meaningful way. The plot felt smooth and easy to follow. It kept moving forward, and the novel used the set-up the prophecy made to make everything seem like it fit into it, with sudden unexpected twists that may leave you thinking about the next prophecy phase as you go along. The characters collaborate and pull through many obstacles, while helping each other out. The characters, whether they’re part of the main ones or not, play some role in assisting the quest such as transport, like the bats in this excerpt “Both sides saw the obvious advantage to joining together. But beyond our alliance, individual bats and humans may form their own union. That is called bonding” (Collins 66). The group of travelers need each other like in this excerpt, “I am planning to overthrow King Gorger and I need you to help me.” (Collins 208), which shows that each character is in the quest for a reason, yet they don’t know how things will unravel due to how cryptic the prophecy is.

            I would recommend this novel to people looking into fun, adventurous novels, since it encapsulates what a fantasy novel should really be about.