The Hadley Academy for the Improbably Gifted

By: Atiya Irvin-Mitchell

What happens when your best friend’s conspiracy theory about an academy that collects superpowered kids so they can train to save the world turns out to be very real? If you’re Jack in The Hadley Academy for the Improbably Gifted by Conor Grennan you get plucked out of class, chased by monsters and drafted into a war you had no idea was going on. In a story about friendship and destiny, The Hadley Academy for the Improbably Gifted shows readers being the chosen ones not always all it’s cracked up to be.

The Hadley Academy for the Improbably Gifted follows the story of Jack Carlson, a middle school student who is told he specifically is prophesied to end The Reaper War. That is if he, along with a rag tag group of other new recruits, can manage to learn to work together to protect the world in the meantime. Also, there’s just the tiniest detail of Jack having no obvious powers at this school for super teen soldiers despite being the chosen one. Eighth grade never seemed like such an appealing alternative.

The story itself is fast-paced, funny and action packed. Although the action means readers will never be bored, on the other hand sometimes it means if you blink you might miss an important detail. Additionally, occasionally the narrative seems to forget certain things have happened.

Author Conor Grennan is a bestselling New York Times author, well known for his memoir Little Princes: One Man’s Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal. Grennan is also the founder of a nonprofit named Next Generation of Nepal, an organization that dedicates its time to reconnecting trafficked children with their families in Nepal.

Despite its flaws, The Hadley Academy for the Improbably Gifted is a story that is both action-packed and heartwarming. The book could even attract fans of Percy Jackson and Harry Potter. All the kids the audience meet in the story feel authentic and, in a genre dominated by often magical, chosen boys and girls remind us that superpowers don’t make adolescence any less painful. Within the story Grennan subverts the chosen one trope in unexpected ways and keeps readers guessing.