Teacher Elena Fairchild is married to Malcolm, one of the heads of the Department of Education responsible for making the rules and a more despicable man you could not meet! A cold man yet one who shows favouritism within the family, he is insistent that the rules must be followed even when it affects his own child, Elena has to make a desperate choice when the Q number for her youngest child Freddie falls below the desired level and she faces being sent to a yellow school. No-one wants to be sent to a yellow school. Whilst children with the highest Q go to the elite schools (silver) and receive the best education, those with the lowest are sent far away from their families to federal schools (yellow), with green being in the middle. For adults it may determine which jobs you can have, or even which supermarket queue you can use. Q is a quotient number – based on intelligence, income, parents’ education, exam results, attendance records, performance and other factors and it is recalculated each month based on testing. Set in an American dystopian world, everyone has a Q number which affects every aspect of their life, even babies are allocated a number at birth based on their parent’s Q. Q is a story based around a nightmare scenario that you think couldn’t possibly happen… could it? I haven’t read much dystopian fiction but I do like to dip my toe in now and again and this looked such a fascinating read. Instead, teachers can focus on the gifted.Įlena tells herself it’s not about eugenics, not really, but when one of her daughters scores lower than expected and is taken away, she intentionally fails her own test to go with her.īut what Elena discovers is far more terrifying than she ever imagined… Now everyone must undergo routine tests for their quotient, Q, and any children who don’t measure up are placed into new government schools.

A good thing, since the recent mandate that’s swept the country is all about perfection. Her daughters are exactly like her: beautiful, ambitious, and perfect. Source: Copy provided by publisher for reviewĮlena Fairchild is a teacher at one of the state’s new elite schools. Available in ebook, hardback, audio (30 April 2020) | paperback (7 January 2021)

Q christina dalcher