Summary

Some two and a half centuries after its creation, the city of Ember is in a
state of crisis. Chronic supply shortages and blackouts ravish the city,
which is devoid of any natural light, while a deadly coughing disease
plagues its populace. Ember’s surviving citizens, largely impoverished and
often consumed by total darkness, live in fear and sense impending doom.

The story begins in the distant past, shortly after Ember’s “Builders” have
completed construction of the city. Its chief builder, during a discussion with
his assistant, reveals that its inhabitants must live there for at least 200
years and that the Builders will provide a list of critical instructions intended
for Ember’s future citizens. The instructions will be sealed in a box with a
timed lock programmed to open at the right date. Only the city’s mayors, in
succession, are to know about the box, though none of them will know what
is contained within. At this point, the Builders’ identity and their purpose for
creating the city remain a mystery.

With Ember’s origin story, however vaguely, now established, the story
fast-forwards to the present. It is year 241, though by now citizens have lost
an accurate count of how many years have passed since the city’s
inception. Twelve-year-old Lina Mayfleet, who has recently graduated from
school and joined the adult workforce as a Messenger, finds the secret box
in her apartment after her Granny dislodges it from the far depths of a
closet. The box, now open, has remained there for generations after Lina’s
great-great-grandfather and Ember’s seventh mayor, Podd Morethwart,
absconded with the box and tried, unsuccessfully, to unlock it for his own
benefit. Next to the box, Lina sees that her baby sister, Poppy, has torn and
chewed its contents: a piece of paper, now in fragments strewn across the
floor, lined with perfect printing that Lina believes must have come from the
Builders.

Like all of Ember’s citizens, Lina has been taught that Ember stands alone,
that it is a solitary city in an otherwise empty world engulfed in darkness
beginning at the city’s edges and extending forever in the Unknown
Regions. But she believes and has faith in a city of light, one she often
dreams of and draws in pictures that decorate the walls of her apartment.
She also believes that the piece of paper from the unlocked box contains a
vital message that could save Ember from a tragic fate.
Lina determines, then, to decode the paper’s message, filling in its broken
and missing words. Lina enlists the help of Doon Harrow, a friend and
former schoolmate who now works in the underground labyrinth of Ember’s
Pipeworks and who shares her passion for saving the city. With assistance
from Lina’s friend, Clary, who works in the city’s greenhouses, the two soon
see that the message contains a seven-step list of instructions for exiting
Ember. Its point of egress, they ultimately discover, is in the Pipeworks and
its source, a raging underground river that powers the city’s failing
generator. Their curiosity and determination also lead them to hidden
rooms, hollowed out along the river’s edge and filled with matches,
candles, and boats for all of Ember’s citizens to escape.

While Lina and Doon work to decode the message, they uncover unsettling
truths about the city and some of its residents. Lina learns that her friend
Lizzie Bisco has been stealing coveted storeroom goods with her boyfriend
and fellow storeroom worker, Looper. While exploring an off-limits tunnel in
the Pipeworks, Doon discovers a secret room where Mayor Cole hordes
rare and precious supplies, including food and light bulbs. The two children
take their findings to Assistant Guard Barton Snode at Ember’s Gathering
Hall, but their attempts to reveal the mayor’s corruption backfire. City
guards, conspiring with the mayor, set out to capture Lina and Doon and
punish them for spreading what they say are vicious rumors.

Lina and Doon had planned to reveal Ember’s exit instructions and the
mayor’s lies at Singing, an annual event where citizens gather to sing the
city’s three great songs. But as they hide from the guards in Ember School,
they decide instead to exit the city that day after leaving a message with
Clary so that their fellow citizens can do the same.

Lina and Doon escape with Poppy by boat and, after reaching the river’s
end, see a sign from the Builders, welcoming refugees from Ember. They
then ascend a steep passage that emerges into a vast wilderness lit with
moonlight and other natural wonders they have never before seen. As Lina
and Doon read a journal left near the river’s end by one of Ember’s first
inhabitants, they can finally make full sense of Ember’s mystery: The
Builders, a group of concerned scientists and engineers, created the city as
an underground refuge for humans, believing the earth was in great peril at
the time. Now, centuries later, Lina and Doon feel unsure if anyone is still
alive on the surface.
Having realized that Lina is still carrying the note for Clary, the children fear
those remaining in Ember will not find the way out. As they search for a
way back into Ember, they follow a steep climb leading to an indent in the
earth and within a narrow tunnel that ends with an immense drop and a
dramatic discovery: Visible by a cluster of electric lights, Ember exists at
the bottom of the vast chasm, and the only way for Lina and Doon to make
contact is with Clary’s note. Lina weighs the message down with a rock,
wraps it in Doon’s shirt, and then hurls the bundle into the darkness below.
Back in Ember, the message lands, directly in front of one of Lina’s
neighbors.

Story analysis

The main conflict in The City of Ember is the city itself. Its resources are
dwindling and the city is dying, and Doon knows this but feel powerless to
stop it, which causes him great internal strife. Before she reconnects with
Doon and learns about Ember’s fragile state, Lina’s main conflict is the
death of her parents, which is of course utterly beyond her control. Once
Lina and Doon join forces to investigate the problems plaguing Ember and
search for a solution, they both realize that they can exert control over their
external environment and refocus their internal energy to create positive
changes for themselves and their community.
Assignment Day is the catalyst for the story’s action. While the job selection
is random, Doon immediately propels the plot forward by switching
assignments with Lina. It briefly stalls when he realizes how little he knows
about electricity and becomes frustrated, but while Lina doesn’t know it yet,
her first encounter with Looper sparks a string of discoveries that will lead
to a major spike in the action, the discovery of the mayor’s hoarding
scheme. This pattern of taking two steps forward and one step back
continues until the book’s first climax: Doon and Lina’s discovery that the
Instructions detail a way out of Ember.

There are many other discoveries along the way to deciphering the
meaning of “egress,” most notably the discovery of the document itself. The
fact that Poppy, who is pre-verbal, was the one who both discovered and
destroyed it is not only ironic but also a continuation of the stop-and-start
path on the way to its translation and the main characters’ eventual escape.
Lina and Doon seek out and piece together much of the information that
they find on their own, but accidental discoveries spur much of the action.
Just as Poppy happened open the Instructions in Chapter 6 and the
notebook in Chapter 18, Lina happens to run into Lizzie just before she
happens to trip and reveal the contents of her sack.

Once Lina and Doon realize that the Instructions are their way out of
Ember, they can envision a way to resolve the conflict and save their city,
but first they have to get out, and there are several internal and external
conflicts along the way. The internal conflicts include Doon’s desire to
share his discoveries with his father versus his desire for his father to find
out via an awards ceremony or similarly showy announcement. Lina also
battles with the urge to literally shout from the rooftops in Chapter 16, all
while feeling conflicted about whether or not to bring Poppy on the journey.
Though they encounter them at different times, both Lina and Doon face
external threats in the form of the mayor and the guards, who seek to derail
the action entirely.

When Lina, Doon, and Poppy reunite in Chapter 17 the action rises
continuously until the book’s main climax—when they set their boat loose
on the river. Their journey on the water is harrowing, and they have no time
to think as they draw upon their instincts, endurance, and bravery to stay
afloat and stay together. In calmer waters their minds are calmer as well,
and when the boat finally comes to a halt it is not an abrupt stop but a
smooth segue into the final leg of their journey.

The information in the journal that Poppy finds in Chapter 18 serves as the
denouement, but Lina and Doon are not able to stop and read it until
Chapter 20. Before they do they must first take stock of their situation and
absorb their new surroundings. Their encounter with the fox confirms their
place in this world and puts them in the proper frame of mind to process the
information in the notebook, which is necessary for them to resolve the
conflict and decide on their next course of action. By this time Lina and
Doon’s internal conflicts are resolved, and it seems as though resolution is
possible for Ember. Because the ending is a literal cliffhanger, however, it
is not clear how long it will take for that final resolution to happen.
Characters

Lina Mayfleet
One of the novel’s protaganists. Lina is twelve years old, and lives with her
grandmother and baby sister. Lina works as a messenger and takes good
care of her grandmother and sister, whom she loves very much.

Doon Harrow
One of the novel’s protaganists. Doon is twelve years old and lives with his
father. He works in the Pipeworks. He is a good son and wants to make his
father proud. He and Lina were good friends when they were younger.

Loris Harrow
Doon’s father. He is a thoughtful man and a good father to Doon. He runs a
shop that sells useful small objects.

Clary Laine
Head of the Greenhouse where Lina’s father used to work. She is a
deliberate, trustworthy person, and is very kind to Lina.

Mrs. Murdo
Lina’s neighbor. She is a gentle woman who brings order and comfort to
Lina and Poppy’s lives.

Granny
Lina’s grandmother. She loves Lina and Poppy but has a difficult time
caring for them due to her old age. She runs a yarn shop beneath their
apartment. Her short-term memory is failing but she remembers things that
happened long ago. Her grandfather was the seventh mayor of Ember.

Poppy
Lina’s baby sister. She is old enough to babble and to walk on her own.
She has a sweet nature and is very curious about her surroundings.

Mayor Cole
The Mayor of Ember, and the main antagonist. He likes to hear himself talk,
but doesn’t much care for the opinions of others. He tells the people of
Ember what he thinks they want to hear, and thinks that he knows what is
best for everyone. He enjoys the power of his position and wielding it over
others. He remembers slights and holds a grudge against those who
challenge him. He is not an honest man.

Lizzie Bisco
Lina’s best friend from school. She is twelve years old and works in the
Supply Depot. She is very talkative, and doesn’t seem to care if the person
she is talking to is listening or not. She is preoccupied with the mundane
details of her own life, and is somewhat vain. Her morals are flexible when
it is convenient for her.

Looper Windley
A Supply Depot employee a few years older than Lina and Doon. He is
manipulative and opportunistic.

Captain Fleery
Lina’s boss. She is a kind and competent woman who treats Lina with
kindness.

Barton Snode
An assistant guard who works the desk at the Gathering Hall.

Redge Stabmark
The Chief Guard. He takes his job very seriously, and seems to enjoy
bossing other people around.

Sadge Merrall
A Supply Depot clerk. He is not mentally stable.
Farlo Batten
The head of the storerooms.

Themes

Fear of the Unknown

By establishing an area of Ember referred to as the Unknown Regions, the
Builders instilled a fear of the unknown in Ember’s future citizens from the
very beginning. Those first citizens came to Ember as babies, and their
caregivers were old people who were forbidden to bring any items into
Ember that might hint at the existence of an outside world. The next
generation’s parents would be parented by their biological parents, who
taught them only what they knew, and all they ever knew was Ember.

School children learned from The Book of the City of Ember until they were
old enough to work at the age of twelve, insuring that the workforce was
capable enough to keep the city alive but ignorant enough to fear the
unknown and not venture out into it until it was safe enough to do so. The
dark is inherently unknowable, and by shrouding the city in darkness the
Builders were able to play upon the innate human fear of it to execute their
plan to save humanity.
Greed
The Builders took human nature into account when they created a city
surrounded by darkness and used fear to ensure that its citizens remained
there. They did not, however, account for greed. This human failing is
perhaps as big of a threat to the people of Ember as the possibility of them
learning about the world outside before it is safe to return.

Even though he didn’t know what it contained, the seventh mayor of

Ember’s desire to survive led him to break his promise and jeopardize the
box and its contents. Mayor Cole did not know of the box at all, but his
greed led him to hoard the city’s scarce resources at a rate that far
outpaced his personal needs, all while his constituents scraped by. Looper
and Lizzie’s faulty logic that they might as well enjoy it while they can would
only increase consumptions of already scarce supplies. Unlike Lina, who in
Chapter 14 wonders if the mayor will enjoy sitting alone in his storeroom
once the generator breaks, they do not stop to think beyond their present-
day desires.
The Importance of Family and Community
The first families of Ember were created artificially by the Builders in order
to ensure that no one would have memories of a world outside of it. The
first group of babies grew up to parent their own children, who would
embark on their life’s work at the age of twelve. Going to work and
committing to a career path at such a young age likely guarantees that the
bonds at the workplace are as deep as they are at home, an important way
to make sure that everyone in Ember does their job well and that the city
survives.

Family and community are important on an individual level as well. Lina is a

child with very adult responsibilities and an orphan, so it is crucial that she
have other adults in her life that she can rely on, especially once Granny
dies. Lina does not ask for help from Mrs. Murdo or from Clary, but they
both offer it freely, and once she benefits from their compassion Lina
realizes how valuable it is. Clary is the one person that Lina can trust with
her message about leaving Ember, and even though she cannot choose
who will receive the amended version that she and Doon throw down into
Ember in Chapter 20, it is fitting that Mrs. Murdo is the one to find it.

Creatures
Doon’s worm is a dramatic symbol of the power of the natural world, but it
is one of several creatures that Doon has attempted to capture and
observe. Because Ember is underground he is limited to looking at bugs,
but look he does, even in the most underground place of all, the Pipeworks.
Above ground he and Lina both marvel at the fox, and its appearance both
confirms the wisdom of their journey and provides them with fruit so that
they can continue it.

Messages
Lina spends her work day delivering messages, and her precious time
before the lights go out at night deciphering the message in the
Instructions. There is no need to decipher the message in the journal that
Poppy finds, its words are intact and its author is thorough. Looper’s
message to the mayor sets off a chain reaction of discoveries, as does the
message that Lina delivers to Clary at the greenhouses. The message that
Lina is unable to deliver to Clary is the most important of all, and the book’s
final action occurs when she and Doon send the amended version down
into Ember.

Rituals
The Builders created the physical city of Ember from whole cloth, but it is
not clear whether they or its citizens established the rituals and rhythms
that shape people’s day-to-day lives. The Singing is the only holiday in this
season-less city, a way for people to both reinforce their love for their city
and mark the passage of another year. Children read The Book of the City
of Ember during their school years, and begin their adult lives on
Assignment Day. Doon dreams of a ceremony during which the whole city
will honor him, and he and Lina both envision grand gestures such as a
surprise announcement during the Singing.

Symbols

The Colored Pencils

The colored pencils symbolize the dangers of greed. Lina loses her senses
in their presence and wastes her family’s scarce budget on a luxury for
herself. Once she gets them home, however, they symbolize the power of
her imagination. When she colors a sky blue for the first time she has no
idea that the sky outside of Ember is blue, but doing so allows her to
imagine how wonderful a blue sky would be.

The Seed and The Worm

The seed that Lina sprouts and the worm that Doon keeps in a box
symbolize the untapped potential within Lina and Doon themselves. When
Clary gives Lina the seed and plants it for her, she also plants the idea that
the seed knows what to do to make a bean plant because there is life
inside it. No one needs to tell the seed how to grow just as no one needs to
tell the worm how to become a moth. Doon has read about this
transformation, but it doesn’t compare to seeing it with his own eyes, just
as planning his journey does not compare to actually undertaking it.

The Singing
The Singing is Lina’s favorite day of the year, and it symbolizes the
strength of the people of Ember and of the community they have formed.
When Lina stands in silence before it commences she is alive with
anticipation, and she listens to each song, searches for meaning in its
lyrics, and thinks about how each song makes her feel. If the citizens are
able to raise their voices as one, it is also possible that they will be able to
leave Ember as one and create a new world together just as the original
citizens did when they arrived in Ember.

The River
The river that powers Ember symbolizes the world left behind, and it is the
most dramatic element of the city that echoes the natural world. Because it
is out of sight of everyone except those who work at the Pipeworks, its
citizens can only appreciate its majesty once a year when they sing “The
Song of The River.” Lina and Doon are the only ones who know that it also
provides a way back to the natural world.

Quotes by themes

Fear of the Unknown

‘Nothing! Nothing! There is nothing out there!’ His voice became a
shout and his eyes looked wild again. ‘Or if there is we can never get
to it. Not without a light.’

In Chapter 4 Sadge Merrall does not let his fear of the unknown prevent
him from exploring the Unknown Regions, but it does send him running
back to the light. When he gets to the greenhouse he is nearly
inconsolable, even in Clary’s calming presence. He claims that he knew it
would be dark and that he kept telling himself to take just one more step.
Eventually his imagination begins to fill in the blackness, and once his
imagination gets away from him, he cannot rein it in. He envisions deep pits
and creatures that bite, and runs screaming and sobbing back to the city.
When Lina sees him raving on the steps of the Gathering Hall in Chapter 5,
he is shouting that there is no hope and spreading his fear of the unknown
amongst the other citizens of Ember.
‘It couldn’t mean that. The bank goes straight down like a wall. You
couldn’t go down to the edge of the water, you’d fall in.’

In Chapter 13 Lina and Clary are poring over the Instructions and trying to
decipher the fragments of words. When Clary suggests that one phrase
could refer to going down to the edge of the water, Lina is terrified. She has
seen how steep the riverbank is and cannot fathom a way to approach the
river, and shivers when she thinks of its dark, swiftly moving water. Almost
immediately after this exchange, Lina declares the whole thing hopeless,
the same takeaway that Sadge had from his misadventures in the
Unknown Regions. That Lina and Sadge both jumped to the same
conclusion suggests that they think it is somehow easier to accept defeat
than to be terrified to an unknown degree and for an unknown amount of
time.

There is no place but Ember. Ember is the only light in a dark world.

In Chapter 15 Lina recalls the refrain from The Book of the City of Ember,
which is sitting on the shelf in her old classroom. By this point she knows
that the words are untrue, though she does not know why the book would
say this. It is unclear whether the book was written by the Builders or by a
citizen of Ember, but the effect that it has on the populace is clear. Thinking
that only darkness surrounds them would keep most sane people from
exploring beyond Ember’s borders, ensuring that no one will try to leave
before the two-hundred years are up. Ironically, it is just as Lina ponders
these words that Doon suggests that they leave right that day, and the two
of them conquer their fear of the unknown at last.
Greed
‘If there’s only one can of peaches left, only one person gets to have
it, right? So why should everyone know? They’d just end up fighting
over it. What good would that be?’

In Chapter 11 Lizzie rationalizes her participation in Looper’s black-market

scheme when Lina confronts her about her source for canned goods. Lina
has plainly pointed out that Looper is stealing, but Lizzie is so greedy for
both his attention and his contraband that she is able to create a false
narrative to assuage any guilt she might have. In her scenario, she and
Looper actually do their fellow citizens a favor by sparing them from fighting
over things.
In the same breath Lizzie offers to get some items for Lina, presumably as
a favor in exchange for keeping Lizzie’s secret. She shares Looper’s self-
serving rationale that these things will all be gone soon enough, so the
lucky few might as well enjoy themselves. Lina pauses to consider this
before remembering the unpleasant feeling she had when she coveted the
colored pencils, a feeling that distracted her so much that she lost track of
her own sister.

‘That’s the solution he keeps telling us about. It’s a solution for him,
not the rest of us. He gets everything he needs, and we get the
leftovers! He doesn’t care about the city. All he cares about is his fat
stomach!’
In Chapter 12 Doon discovers that the mysterious room in the Pipeworks is
not a way out of Ember, it is a well-stocked storeroom where the mayor
hoards light bulbs and gorges himself on a larger variety of food than
anyone else has and in larger amounts than he needs. Doon is shaking
with anger at the injustice of it even before Lina tells him what she knows
about Looper’s role in the scheme. For Doon the mayor’s corruption is
terrible, but the fact that there is a network to abet it is even worse.
Unfortunately it does not occur to either Doon or Lina that the guards they
plan to share the mayor’s secret with might well be just as corrupt as he is.
If Looper is able to buy Lina’s loyalty with some compliments and a few
canned goods, the mayor is surely able to appeal to the greed of his guards
to secure theirs.

‘There is so much darkness in Ember, Lina. It’s not just outside, it’s
inside us, too. Everyone has some darkness inside. It’s like a hungry
creature. It wants and wants and wants with a terrible power. And the
more you give it, the bigger and hungrier it gets.’
In Chapter 13 Lina tells Clary about the Instructions and about the mayor’s
greedy stockpiling scheme. Given her propensity for plants it is unclear how
Clary knows so very much about human nature, but she also says that she
knew the mayor when he was merely foolish, but not wicked. Her allegory
about the hungry creature is apt given that Lina knows firsthand the awful
feeling she had when she left her own greed about the colored pencils
unchecked. Because Lina is an empathetic person she briefly feels sorry
for the mayor when she considers how awful he must feel to never be
satisfied, and that this urge must drown out any other thoughts.
The Importance of Family and Community
‘It hasn’t worked right since…’ Clary hesitated and glanced sideways
at Lina. ‘For a long time.’

In Chapter 4 Lina delivers a message to Clary at the greenhouses where

her father used to work. As soon as she enters she is overcome by
emotion, and recalls the many happy hours she spent there with him. Lina
has just told Clary how Granny and Poppy are doing, and Clary talks about
a problem with the sprinkler system. She hesitates because she is about to
say “since your father died,” and Lina understands this.

Clary’s knowledge of and concern for Lina’s family illustrate that she is not
just a former coworker of her father’s, she is invested in Lina. Clary does
not take the place of Lina’s father just as Mrs. Murdo does not take the
place of Granny, but like Mrs. Murdo she provides a comfortable space for
Lina away from the busyness so that she can sort out her thoughts.

‘Well,’ said Mrs. Murdo briskly. ‘It’s just common sense. You need a
place, I have one. You go on now, and I’ll see you this evening.’

In Chapter 11 Granny has just died, and Mrs. Murdo offers Lina and Poppy
a home as matter-of-factly as if she is lending them a potato. Her
relationship with them before Lina asked her to start looking in on Granny
was unclear, but either it was warm enough or the bonds between
neighbors in Ember are strong enough that Lina doesn’t hesitate to ask for
a favor, and Mrs. Murdo doesn’t hesitate to agree.

Lina also does not hesitate to agree to Mrs. Murdo’s offer, and when she
does she gets more than a roof over her head. Mrs. Murdo’s presence
allows her to go to work without worrying about Poppy, and to enjoy meals
that she doesn’t have to cook herself. When Mrs. Murdo takes care of
Lina’s basic needs, it allows Lina to focus on the mental task of deciphering
the Instructions.

‘But I can’t just leave,’ said Lina. ‘How could I leave Poppy? And not
even say goodbye to her? Not know where I’m going, or if I’m ever
coming back? How could you go without saying goodbye to your
father?’
In Chapter 15 Lina and Doon are hiding from the guards in their old
classroom, and Doon suggests that they leave Ember that day. Lina is
aghast at the notion of leaving Poppy, and can’t fathom how Doon could
leave his father. Doon is not being cold-hearted, however; he is simply
confident enough in their plan that he sincerely believes that everyone in
Ember, including his father, will follow them shortly and that Poppy is safer
with Mrs. Murdo in the meantime. Ever since Doon learned of the dangers
facing his community he fought to find a solution, and now his community
has grown to include Lina. If it were not for her input and ideas, it is likely
that Doon would never have had a plan at all.