“Gearbreakers” by Zoe Hana Mikuta: A Cautionary Tale
Gearbreakers by Zoe Hana Mikuta takes on a worldwide classic story: larger-than-life mechas with the ability to communicate or interface with a human brain. Transformers. Pacific Rim. Mobile Suit Gundam. Neon Genesis Evangelion. Voltron. Marvel’s Ultron. Power Rangers. The list of notable mecha properties extends for miles, with each one carving out its own niche in the genre. Mikuta’s story spins a tale about Sona, a mecha pilot who doubts her allegiances after her humanity has been ripped from her by the Academy — and Eris, a rebel from outside the city that pulls death-defying odds to take down these mechas from the inside. The compelling back-cover synopsis, beautiful cover, and exciting enemies-to-lovers concept makes for a book that’s easy to pick off the shelf.
As an action-rich sci-fi adventure for tweens, Gearbreakers tells an excellent story about how it’s never too late to take back one’s humanity and choose virtue. Therein lies the issue: the duology is marketed for young adults far more than tweens, and young adult humor, interests, and mannerisms hardly match that of the protagonists we encounter. Perhaps this is moreso an issue with the publishing industry, and the way people perk up more at the sound of “YA Dystopia” more than “Teen Fiction”. Nonetheless, this novel, to me, was more cautionary tale than star-crossed love story. Cluttered character introductions and an a tell-more-than-you-show approach make for a novel that gives you a quick chuckle at best, but falls flat otherwise.
More is Less
I do believe that, as your audience ages, subtlety is a well-loved tool — especially when assigning names. Godolia, for a story where machines are worshiped as gods, would be much better suited as Etherea, Empyrea, Elysia, Valhalla, Arcadia, or any other world that references heaven/paradise without the word God in it. The same principle goes for names like Arsen Theifson. I don’t know what else to say for that one. It seems that the families out in the Badlands doom their children hopelessly to a life of crime by way of name.
There is no missing the classic YA Attempt To Avoid Monotheism — that is to say, you will never find the word God on its own. Only Gods, Goddess, Hells, Heavens, and the like. Substituting real-world exclamations or swears takes an unholy amount of needle-threading. As a lifelong Star Wars fan, I am no stranger to this. Just let them say fuck. Whatever “in-universe” derivative of an English expletive an author comes up with, it will seldom rival the swear word it began as. The use of the word rot in place of other exclamations, as well as oh my Gods and what the hells only served to pull me out of the story, and these characters are quite liberal in their use of all three. I found myself pulled out from the story after every single one, struggling to surround myself back into the plot.
I tried to maintain the benefit of the doubt, but quite simply, Mikuta’s syntax falls flat on young adult eyes more often than not. Explanations are directly told to the reader rather than shown by way of plot or dialogue. A sentence like, “They have not given me power; they have given me the ability to come undone” is poetic and heartfelt, while “…because hate is easy, and my hate is bigger thing than me” is such a strangely structured, typo-ridden sentence that it intrigues me how it slipped into the final draft. I hate to nitpick grammar, but this is a MacMillan novel being mass produced in the thousands. There is very little reason why verbally listed names lack spaces between their commas and entire articles are missing from sentences.
As for the storyline itself, proper nouns and supporting characters get thrown at the reader with little more than a sentence to explain their importance. Twenty names are introduced in the first 80 pages of the novel — a new individual every four pages, if divided evenly. When the protagonist of a story is flanked by broad swaths of supporting characters, it risks gumming up the main plotline. The reader is too caught up in trying to remember twenty names and faces that, when the time comes for a watershed moment in the protagonist’s story, it’s backed by a lot of literary noise.
Let’s also not forget: the Gearbreakers are terrorists, in the eyes of the government. That label carries a lot of weight and makes for some interesting questions on identity and morality. And when the most powerful people in the nation give a highly successful terrorist a superhero nickname like Frostbringer, that weight disappears. The Gearbreakers become larger-than-life heroes, completely undermining that their biggest strength against the mecha Pilots is that they’re human. They are dysfunctional, flawed, and illegitimate. A nickname only legitimizes them, which is a decision that feels out-of-character for the Pilots to make. I have a similar sentiment towards the idea that the Gearbreakers have a headquarters, as mentioned in Chapter 2. If their whole goal is to stick it to the man, then isn’t having a man of their own the complete antithesis of their cause? Rebellion in media is at its best when it’s decentralized groups of people who work with each other, not for each other. Rebellion does not play by the rules.
An Almost-Perfect Shelf Life
Like I said, Gearbreakers is a wonderful story for tweens. I would have adored a story about these robo-girls when I was twelve, and with a queer romance, no less. But instead of carving out its niche alongside the likes of Marissa Meyer’s Lunar Chronicles, this novel is erroneously placed in front of an older audience whose humor, philosophy, and dialogue is seldom reflected by the events that Eris and Sona face. There is absolutely nothing wrong with writing teen/tween fiction — hell hath no fury like a middle school girl who loves to read — but there is something wrong with not playing to the strengths of that audience. Again, this may be a fault of the publisher and those stocking store shelves. Accelerated Reader, an academic program meant to assign quizzes and point-values to novels for K-8 students, places Gearbreakers at a 5.8. Literally, this means the syntax of the novel lives at an almost-sixth-grader’s reading comprehension. But more truthfully (as a former child in AR curriculum), that places it with an audience of mainly seventh and eighth graders. Middle schoolers are a powerful demographic. For a massive population of children, that is the defining moment that will determine whether they read obsessively for the rest of their life, or endure high school as a person who can’t bear the thought of reading for fun. Mikuta has provided them with an incredible story; I only wish that it was properly marketed to them.
This is certainly nowhere near the end for Mikuta; every author begins somewhere, and for her first novel to be a front-facing book (or an end-of-the-bookshelf display) in every bookstore I found it at is no small feat. The cover art is gorgeous, and her designs for Eris and Sona are nothing short of badass. The book is practically designed for fandom — for a cult following across social media. Mikuta has a knack for creating compelling, unique protagonists, but the writing struggles to support them. I truly think her work could be for Gen Alpha what The Lunar Chronicles was for the younger side of Gen Z, if given time and revision. I have high hopes for her future.
