Tagged: scott westerfeld
The Best and Worst of June
Well, it’s that time of month again. The time for the recap of my 5 best and 5 worst posts of June. The statistics are wildly different than they were when I did my May recap, as you’ll notice. So here are the five best articles, not counting my homepage or site announcements.
1. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
3. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
4. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare
5. The White Queen by Philippa Gregory
It’s hard to believe The Giver is right up there because school’s been out in America for a month, which is where most of my traffic comes from. But what’s really surprising is that The White Queen cracked the list while The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome article fell to third place. Now, here are the surprising five worst articles of June:
1. Pretties by Scott Westerfeld
2. YA Release Dates to Look Forward To
4. Graceling by Kristin Cashore
5. Isabel: Jewel of Castilla by Carolyn Meyer
What’s surprising about the five worst articles and book reviews is that not one of them appeared on my May list, which means that the worst articles are at least rotating every month. However, I’m surprised none of the Pauline Gedge books appear on the list because she’s not exactly a well-known author outside of historical fiction circles. C’est la vie.
Extras by Scott Westerfeld
(Cover picture courtesy of Fantastic Fiction.)
A few years after rebel Tally Youngblood takes down the Specials regime, a cultural renaissance sweeps the world. “Tech-heads” flaunt their latest gadgets, “kickers” spread gossip and trends, and “surge monkeys” are hooked on extreme plastic surgery. Popularity rules, and everyone craves fame.
Fifteen-year-old Aya Fuse is no exception. But Aya’s face rank is so low, she’s a total nobody. An extra. Her only chance at stardom is to kick a wild and unexpected story.
Then she stumbles upon a big secret. Aya knows she is on the cusp of celebrity. But the information she is about to disclose will change both her fate…and that of a brave new world.
If you’ve read the first three books in the Uglies trilogy (which was turned into a series with the release of this book), you will get so much more enjoyment out of Extras. You’ll be able to see just how different Tally’s world has become and yet how much it is like our own world. In Aya’s world, popularity rules. The more popular you are, the more credits you get and the better your life is. But anyone who is not popular—which is most of the population—is an extra, a nobody. Does this remind anyone of high school?
What really stands out in Extras (for me at least) is the explosion of new technologies since Specials. Since practically no one over 16 is a bubblehead anymore, intelligence has been allowed to flourish and Scott Westerfeld describes the new advances in spectacular detail. With all of that new technology and freedom, “surges”—or surgeries—have also become popular, especially the extreme kind. It is a credit to Scott Westerfeld’s world-building abilities that he includes all kinds of people who change their bodies to create their idea of ‘true beauty.’ I find it fascinating what people choose to look like in Aya’s world since they are allowed to change themselves into whoever they want.
As usual, Scott Westerfled’s characterization is spot-on. Many readers will sympathize with Aya because she is the voice of teenage insecurity. Surrounded by beautiful people and being nothing more than an unimportant, faceless extra has really taken its toll on her. As a result, many teenagers will sympathize with her insecurities and will cheer her on as the plot speeds along.
I give this book 4/5 stars.
Specials by Scott Westerfeld
(Cover picture courtesy of Regular Rumination.)
Tally thought they were a rumor, but now she’s one of them. A Special. A super-amped fighting machine, engineered to keep the uglies down and the pretties stupid.
But maybe being perfectly programmed with strength and focus isn’t better than anything she’s ever known. Tally still has memories of something else.
But it’s easy for her to tune them out—until she’s offered a chance to stamp out the rebels of the New Smoke permanently. It all comes down to one last choice: listen to that tiny, faint heart-beat, or carry out the mission she’s programmed to complete. Either way, Tally’s world will never be the same.
For all of Scott Westerfeld’s amazing writing talent, I did not enjoy Specials nearly as much as I enjoyed Uglies or Pretties. It was not because it lacked plot—it actually had an excellent plot—but I found that I really could not relate to Tally anymore. I related to her as an unsure ugly and an airheaded pretty, but I could not relate to her as a cruel special. True, her mind has been altered along with her body to become more predatory, but practically nothing of the old Tally remains. Despite all of her faults, I understood and empathized with the old Tally.
Aside from Tally’s completely 180, Specials is not a bad book. The plot zips right along at a consistently quick rate and the stakes are higher than ever before. Tally has to make incredibly difficult, life-changing decisions as she tries to fight the new lesions that control her mind. Friends turn into enemies and the walls of deceit that were built up through the centuries begin to crumble in the last book in the Uglies trilogy.
If you have read the other two books, then you will likely enjoy Specials. It’s exciting and Tally does great things, but there is also a lot of tragedy, especially near the end. I actually liked the ending and it leaves a lot of room for readers’ imaginations to take flight without completely leaving them hanging.
I give this book 3.5/5 stars.
Pretties by Scott Westerfeld
(Cover picture courtesy of Wikipedia.)
Tally has finally become pretty. Now her looks are beyond perfect, her clothes are awesome, her boyfriend is totally hot and she’s completely popular. It’s everything she’s ever wanted.
But beneath all the fun—the nonstop parties, the high-tech luxury, the total freedom—is a nagging sense that something’s wrong. Something important. Then a message from Tally’s ugly past arrives. Reading it, Tally remembers what’s wrong with pretty life, and the fun stops cold.
Now she has to choose between fighting to forget what she knows and fighting for her life—because the au authorities don’t intend to let anyone with this information survive.
When I first read Pretties, I was infuriated by all the slang the pretties used. But on a second read through, I realized that it demonstrates Tally’s drastic transformation from who she was in Uglies. The slang also shows how vapid pretties are and how much the surgery really affects their minds, instead of only their bodies.
Pretties follows Tally and her new boyfriend Zane as they try to defeat the brain lesions that impair their judgment, coordination and memory. They try all manner of things to stay ‘bubbly’ and it seems like the two pills from Tally’s fugitive friends in the New Smoke are working. But tensions rise as Tally pushes away her old friend Shay and the authorities start to catch on to what Zane and Tally are up to. Tally makes some hard decisions and old friends turn into enemies in the second book of the Uglies trilogy.
I read this book when I was twelve and it really struck a chord with me. Everyone at school was telling me I was ugly (either directly or indirectly) and Pretties gave me a bit more confidence in myself, if only for a short while. It taught me that being pretty isn’t everything and that the pursuit of perfection often leads to ruin. That’s why I recommend this book for tweens and younger teens, especially those with self-esteem problems. Scott Westerfeld deserves to be among the YA greats and the unflinching way he confronts self-esteem issues is inspiring.
I give this book 4.5/5 stars.
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
(Cover picture courtesy of Wikipedia.)
Everybody gets to be supermodel gorgeous. What could be wrong with that?
Tally is about to turn sixteen, and she can’t wait. Not for her license—for turning pretty. In Tally’s world, your sixteenth birthday brings an operation that turns you from a repellent ugly into a stunningly attractive pretty and catapults you into a high-tech paradise where your only job is to have a really great time. In just a few weeks Tally will be there.
But Tally’s new friend Shay isn’t sure she wants to be pretty. She’d rather risk life on the outside. When Shay runs away, Tally learns about a whole new side of the pretty world—and it isn’t very pretty. The authorities offer Tally the worst choice she can imagine: find her friend and turn her in, or never turn pretty at all. The choice Tally makes changes her world forever.
Tally is a character that many young teens can identify with. She just wants to fit in, be with her friend Paris and otherwise live a happy, normal life without drama. But everything changes when she meets Shay, a spunky rule-breaker who doesn’t want to fit in and turn pretty. In the beginning, Tally’s world seems great until Shay points out that the authorities manipulate people into thinking they’re worthless so they conform and want to turn pretty.
Uglies is one of those novels that truly deserves to be among the YA greats. Like Harry Potter, it has many different messages and means something different to each reader. On one hand, it is a commentary on our society’s obsession with beauty, but on the other hand, it is a tale of love and friendship. It’s also a dystopian science fiction novel with many elements that will be familiar to YA readers: a love triangle, a long and dangerous journey, the realization that not everything was as good as it seemed and a tough choice that sets the gears of change in motion.
Uglies is a well-written book that explores many issues teens (especially younger teens) face every day. It is a book that makes you think and I highly recommend it to people ages 12+ who love to question the status quo. Scott Westerfeld really has written one of the great novels of our generation.
I give this book 4.5/5 stars.