5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My Teacher Flunked The Planet by Bruce Coville, September 15, 1997
By A Customer
I have all four books in the My Teacher Is An Alien series, and all of them are great, but this climactic conclusion to the series is the most deep, touching, and downright SCARY of the series. In it, the aliens take down the three kids on an expedition to Earth to check out what should be done about the planet, which is the only planet EVER to be smart enough to achieve space travel, but dumb enough to have wars. Some of the places where they go chilled me to the bone, learning more about the evils of human nature.
In short, this is not the book to read if you're looking for a nice, cheerful book. In fact, it shouldn't be read at all without first reading the first three books in the series, which start out much simpler, and eventually build up to this one. However, it's still a great book, it's just that you'll be halfway through it and you'll say out loud "Geez, the human race sucks!"
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I give this book an A+, May 29, 2006
This was an incredible ending to a fun series that was started with My Teacher is an Alien. While it remained fun, it was also much more intense, like ice water suddenly dumped on you unexpectedly.
But I think it's "kid safe." As a child I saw Return to Oz and had horrid nightmares; by the age of 10 I read a short horror story for adults where I find out that the man telling the story is insane and his family is dead and I broke out in tears. Yet as sensitive as I was, this book did not cause a severe reaction, but pulled me in with its shocking surprises, both hopeful and horrid. Bruce Coville has done a truly amazing job at making the horrors of the world accessible to kids (though probably not younger than 10) without being either traumatizing or patronizing about it, though he did (thankfully) gloss over some of the worse parts. (Example: "What had already been done to those people was so ugly I cannot bring myself to describe it, even though the memory of it remains like a scar burned into my brain with a hot iron.")
Furthermore, I would add that this is not a book promoting any ideology. This doesn't encourage your children to grow up and vote Democrat or Republican, or embrace socialism or libertarianism. This is a book promoting VALUES. And contrary to the propaganda of many ideologues and Party Pushers, values and ideology are two completely different things.
All ideologies, to my knowledge, explain the ways that they think are best for solving the problems Coville brings up. But values determine what gets done; ideology detemines how it gets done. A revolution that changes ideology but not values will only change the HOW things get done, not WHAT gets done. Even functioning anarchies (communes, tribal, even regions like Barcelona in the Spanish Civil War) show that the values that are shared by a community will be displayed, no matter what system is in place.
If I get into an ideological debate with someone who shares the same values as I do, then what we're debating is the best way to solve the same problem, not debating if the problem exists or how important it is. I also find that I much prefer the company of people who have different political leanings from myself but share my values to those who share my political leanings but not my values. I think that Bruce Coville, intentionally or unintentionally, has also expressed this view ("...not the leaders, not the government, just the people..."). Which is to say, don't fear that your child will be brainwashed into serving some political agenda, though Coville might get help your child to care in the first place.
Finally, the book does show much that is noble and good about humanity, too. I found it to be ultimately hopeful, if sobering.
In many ways, it's a child's version of Carl Sagan's Contact. While Contact has a credible alien society, IMO, My Teacher Flunked the Planet has entertaining aliens. But both books help us, kid or adult, look seriously at the insanity of our planet's societies, and also the hope.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Thrilling Conclusion to an Excellent Sci-Fi Series, March 29, 2010
In the final book of the, My Teacher is an Alien, series Susan, Duncan and Peter (the respective main characters of the previous 3 books) come together in an attempt to stop the aliens from destroying Earth.
The political views Coville relates thru this story can be a little challenging for the young audience that the book is intended for. I by no means think that this is a bad thing however. The somewhat negative view expressed that humans are a dangerous species can only make us look at ourselves and strive for improvement. A quality I feel anybody can benefit from.
I have a lot of fun memories reading all 4 books in this series. When I was in middle school I would often spend my rainy weekends in my room reading this series over and over again. Each book has its own unique charm, this last one for example is by far the most serious of the series, which provided an excellent ending and pushed an important message for humanity.
Darien Summers, author of The Mischievous Hare, a children's book.
The Mischievous Hare
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