A 2013 novel, and the sequel to The Compound.
Eli and his family have been in an underground compound for six years, but when they learned it was all a twisted experiment by his father, Eli and his family escape, excluding his father, and reunite with Eli's grandmother and twin brother Eddy. In addition to Eli's family readjusting, Eddy has to readjust to having not only his mother and siblings, but an additional four little kids. But things still can't go back to normal, because now they're famous. After living in a nuclear bunker for so long, people know who they are. As they try to adapt back into every day life, events begin to unfold, and Eli realizes that his father's experimenting is far from over.
No relation to completely different film.
Tropes featured in this book:
- Big Brother Instinct: Eli has this for all of his younger siblings, after he made the decision to be a better brother at the end of the last book.
- Birthday Episode: Quinn turns one in this book and has a penguin themed birthday party.
- Fountain of Youth: Rex literally has a way to reverse the aging process as he turns Phil into a teenager named Tony and turns various people into blobs of goo.
- Gene Hunting: Lexie has an interest in finding her birth parents. She... doesn't get the answers she wanted.
- Gilded Cage: Lexie calls their new home in Mercer Island this, as the Compound turned Clea into a bit of a smother. She later regrets her words when Rex arranges to have her, Eli, and Eddy kidnapped and brought to his island, which really is a gilded cage as he refuses to let them leave.
- Everyone Has Standards: Tony as Phil tried to convince Rex to release everyone upon seeing Eddy's distress. He also admits to Eli he did not agree to kidnapping kids and trapping the family underground.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Rex intends to rebuild his empire and keep his family under his thumb (once again) via the age-reverser. However, it's not reliable, with some of his victims/subjects being de-aged, and others being reduced to piles of sentient flesh. Despite it not being a sound science, Rex is willing to continue the research. He meets his end when he tackles Eli for the gene gun, gets hit with it, and is reduced to a pile of flesh. He's then killed when the island's self-destruct sequence (which he set up and told no one about) goes off.
- I Am Not My Father: Eli says this word for word any time an employee of Rex's company mentions what his father would do in a certain scenario.
- Mad Scientist: Rex. Even Tony/Phil can see that he's gone too far and is attempting things no man should.
- Not Quite Dead: When Eli, Eddy, and Lexie get to the island, their father is revealed to be alive.
- Red Herring: For a while, it looks as though the strange man following the family on their outings is going to be the book's villain... only for Eli to learn that the guy is actually the developer of several Compound knockoffs that he can sell to the rich so they can ride out the nuclear apocalypse, and he wants the Yanakakises to serve as consultants. Eli tells him where to shove it and threatens to call the police if he continues to stalk them. However, his conversation with Eli leads the fifteen-year-old to learn that someone else is watching the family.
- Sick Episode: Cara gets the stomach flu, and passes it on to Lucas, Reese, Eli, and Eddy.
- Stranger in a Familiar Land: Eli feels this way at times, as he spent six years in the Compound and away from regular society. He overhears Eddy telling Tony that he gets so frustrated at times because Eli is either too unfamiliar or too frightened to want to try anything new.
- Suddenly Shouting: Rex screams at everyone after Lexie tells him that they don't want to stay here forever. This is a hint that he's still as unstable as he was in the final days of the Compound.
- Trauma Button: At the aquarium, Eli almost has a panic attack when the lights in the room of the dive show go down. He momentarily feels as though he's back in the Compound, and needs both Lee and Cara before he starts feeling better.
