40 pages • 1 hour read
Emmy LaybourneMonument 14
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-5Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Tinks”
This chapter introduces us to the narrator, Dean Grieder, a junior at Lewis Palmer High School in Monument, Colorado. One morning, Dean and his younger brother, Alex, race to catch their busses, Dean to the high-school bus and Alex to the middle-elementary bus.
On the high-school bus, Dean notices Jake Simonsen “football hero and all-around champion of the popular” and his crush Astrid Heyman, “champion diver on the swim team, scornful goddess, girl of my dreams” (2, 3). No one acknowledges Dean, except for Niko Mills, a boy who is rumored to live with his grandfather in a cabin in the foothills.
Soon, Dean hears, “this little tink, tink, tink sound […] the tinks were like rain, only metallic” (4). Hail comes down, the bus skids on the ice, and flips on its side. The high school bus driver and another student, Trish, die, while the other students duck for cover to avoid the hail that is now coming through the windows. Josie is injured by the hail, but Niko grabs her and drags her to cover under the seat. The bus catches fire and smoke circulates.
Mrs. Wooly, the driver of elementary-middle school bus, crashes her bus into the side of a superstore, the Greenway, so that the children can exit and take cover. Mrs. Wooly comes to the aid of the high school bus and manages to open the emergency exit door.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Space Blankets”
Mrs. Wooly helps the high-school students move through the emergency exit and onto her bus. Dean remains collapsed under an overturned seat and “so warm and sleepy” until Niko discovers him and drags him off the bus (9). In the Greenway, the entire group reconvenes. Mrs. Wooly takes charge and provides water and blankets to the students who are in tough shape. Josie remains in shock from the head wound she received from the hail.
Everyone checks their minitabs, or smart devices, but they are not functioning because the Network is down, and “The Network has never, ever gone down” (16). In this way, the devices are useless and they cannot use them for communication.
Mrs. Wooly sends the younger children to gather clothes for those who require them. Dean changes with Jake and Brayden in the dressing room, and the three banter and end up laughing together despite the fact that they were not friends beforehand.
The hail stops, and Mrs. Wooly leaves the students to go find help. She puts Jake Simonsen in charge, while also instructing Astrid to make lunch for everyone at the Pizza Station. After Mrs. Wooly leaves, Jake notices dead bodies in the parking lot.
Chapter 3 Summary: “Metal Gate”
Astrid prepares pizza for everyone, and Dean makes slushies for the younger children. He interacts with Max, Chloe, Batiste, and Ulysses. Everyone hungrily devours the pizza. Metal grates descend over the windows and doors:“we were being locked in” (32).
The students go to the Media Department, which contains televisions that are not reliant on the Network to operate. They watch CNN, which reports that a volcano erupted on the Canary Islands. The rock and lava that avalanched into the ocean caused a “megatsunami” (34). It hit Boston, New York, Charleston, and Miami and is the “worst natural disaster in recorded history” (34). At this point, they cannot estimate the number of fatalities. The storm also hit three of the five connectivity centers, which is why the students cannot connect to the Network.
The students watch TV for hours, in shock. Some panic while others remain calm. When they finally turn the TV off, Astrid tells the younger kids to go get as much candy as they want. Everyone eats candy before falling asleep in sleeping bags.
Chapter 4 Summary: “Eight Point Two”
This chapter opens on the morning of the second day in the Greenway. The students awake to a foreshock—the ground shakes in warning of an ensuing earthquake. They all take cover under the firmly fastened tables at the Pizza Shack until the aftershocks have abated. As a result, in the store, “everything was a mess and most things made of glass were history” (43). The store itself remains intact since it is “built like a safe” (39).
Tension rises among the students, as the younger ones become upset and insist they want to go home. Jake assures them that no one can leave until Mrs. Wooly has returned.
The students discover that the TV screen has been damaged in the Media Department, but they can still hear the audio. A reporter announces that there has been a chemical leak from the North American Aerospace Defense Command Department (NORAD).Residents within a 500-mile radius must remain indoors and seal all windows.
The students seal up the front gate in the area where the bus has crashed. They use shower curtains, drop cloths, wool blankets and duct tape to seal up the open spaces. Dean realizes that the AC is on and drawing in air from the outside.
Chapter 5 Summary: “Ink”
The students realize they must turn the AC off to keep contaminated air from leaking in. They venture into the operations center, but the AC panel is too complex and Niko suggests that they must turn it off manually. Niko, Alex, Dean, and Jake go up to the roof through a hatch where the units are kept. There, they see Sahalia with an escape ladder. All stare as “a thick streak of pitchblack rose up, twisting like a ribbon through the air” (52). The toxic cloud comes closer and closer.
The ducts on the AC units are damaged and must be closed up. Niko, Alex, and Dean jump on them to do so. Sahalia comes back with a sledgehammer, which Niko uses to close the ducts. Dean starts to feel, “sick in my throat and body and mind. I felt like my blood was on fire. I was so scratchy and irritated I wanted to kill someone” (54). He lunges towards Niko, focused on killing him. Alex trips Dean and drags him through the hatch downstairs. Dean fights Alex and bites him, noting, “I saw red […] I couldn’t think. Just pummel. Pound, tear, destroy” (55). Jake pins Dean to the floor as he continues to struggle.
Chapters 1-5 Analysis
These chapters introduce the thematic tension between the technological and the manual. In Monument, all devices run on National Connectivity, which is, “infallible. We had to believe that because all of our files—photo, movies, emails, everything—were all kept in big servers ‘up in the sky’” (16). Everyone carries around a minitab, which functions like a smartphone. They have megatabs in their homes where they watch TV. When National Connectivity goes down, all of their tabs become useless pieces of metal. These chapters further elucidate this tension through the AC debacle. The students try to turn off the AC through an electronic control panel but do not succeed. They must address it manually by climbing onto the roof and physical turning it off. Since the ducts are damaged, Niko has to fix them by physically hammering them shut. Also, when connectivity goes down, Dean finds a notebook and pens and writes by hand. He engages in this very physical task to connect to his experience and process it.
These chapters also establish social hierarchies, which are a crucial theme of the novel. Characters occupy various social positions: Jake, Brayden, and Astrid occupy the top level, as they are popular and good-looking. Jake and Brayden, “were both on the football team and were built” (18). Dean occupies a lower level—he is unpopular and has no friends. He is not very muscular, but he did grow six inches this past year and hopes this will increase his chances of improving his position. He has a crush on Astrid, though he has never spoken to her prior to the disaster. He notes, “to even dream about Astrid, for a guy like me, in my relatively low position on the social ladder of Lewis Palmer high, was idiotic” (26).
The disaster, however, shakes up this pre-established social order. All the characters occupying different social positions are forced to interact with one another when they never would have before. After everyone changes clothing right after the bus crashes, Dean notes, “But everything had changed and nobody was teasing anybody” (15). Dean also begins to curry favor with Jake. Brayden continues to tease Dean and reinforce his lower social position by emasculating him and calling him “Geraldine” (46). Jake, however, rebuffs Brayden and says, “We’re gonna die from friggin’ NORAD and you’re busting on the booker about his friggin’ physique?” (46). Jake at once asserts his own social dominance and also breaks the former social order by putting Brayden down and elevating Dean.
