Book Title: Uglies
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Series: Uglies #1
Date Started: March 31st 2013
Date Completed: April 3rd 2013
Genres: Dystopian, Thriller, Adventure, Romance, Mystery
Rating: Four stars
Review:
Before I started reading this I'd heard a lot of things about it being brilliant for showing people how our society functioned in an emphasised way. I admit, I didn't agree with this at first, however once I got through to the later parts of the book, I realised that it did indeed do this and, furthermore, it lured myself (as the reader) into a sense of normality before throwing them completely off and revealing that what we had been lead to believe and accept was completely wrong - and then it went on to link it to our modern day society. So that part was very very impressive.
Basically, this book is about a girl who lives in a world where when teenagers turn 16, they are taken away and they are made pretty. They then go and live, having fun, for the rest of their lives, all looking exactly the same in order to prevent discrimination. However, over time, the uglies (people not yet turned into pretties) are looked down upon.
Tally wants nothing more to turn pretty and join her older friends in New Pretty Town (I admit, the names did put me slightly off). But then she meets a girl, and after becoming good friends and sneaking around behind their government's back, her friend wants to run away to stay an ugly. She tries to persuade Tally, but she refuses.
Yet, as fate would have it, the plot twists and Tally is forced to go looking for her friend after she has escaped. But Tally's future isn't as easy as 'go-there, get-her, come-back-and-turn-pretty' unfortunately.
For me, this book had the perfect amount of romance. It wasn't present at all until about halfway through the book, where we start learning about the love interest - and we don't even realise he is that until a little later. I really enjoyed this slow introduction to the character (which I will not name so you might not see it coming (for the record, I did)) and felt like I actually knew him very well before Tally kissed him or whatever. I also felt that the characters were very well managed, and the fact that there was a little unusual twist between their relationship appealed to me.
This book is very different from other Young Adult fiction in several ways; two of which I have already mentioned (being the easy romance and involvement of our own discrimination about each other). But the most obvious of which is the reasoning behind the dystopian setting. In most post-apocalyptic books, it goes almost unsaid that there was a war over power between humans (or sometimes aliens, I admit) themselves, and then one particular side won and took over. However, Uglies is based around the fact that their modern society was created in favour of making the world better - and the intentions actually genuinely to benefit the majority of humans. They left nature alone - stopping cutting trees, burning resources for fuels, hunting animals, using their skins and fur for clothing and accessories - allowing the eco-system to re-set itself. Furthermore, the reason for the main plot of the story was to prevent wars and discrimination and tensions by making everyone the same and equal. I especially liked this feature as it made the whole world of Uglies suddenly very real and believable.
I would recommend this book to pretty much anyone, especially if you're into dystopian novels, or novels that take reality and put a different spin on our society and ways of life. It's a fascinating read, I'll put it like that.
Do note, though, that the beginning, although whilst maybe not being uneventful, is slow, but I promise it does pick up by about a third of the way through.
Image Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13581049-uglies
Before I started reading this I'd heard a lot of things about it being brilliant for showing people how our society functioned in an emphasised way. I admit, I didn't agree with this at first, however once I got through to the later parts of the book, I realised that it did indeed do this and, furthermore, it lured myself (as the reader) into a sense of normality before throwing them completely off and revealing that what we had been lead to believe and accept was completely wrong - and then it went on to link it to our modern day society. So that part was very very impressive.
Basically, this book is about a girl who lives in a world where when teenagers turn 16, they are taken away and they are made pretty. They then go and live, having fun, for the rest of their lives, all looking exactly the same in order to prevent discrimination. However, over time, the uglies (people not yet turned into pretties) are looked down upon.
Tally wants nothing more to turn pretty and join her older friends in New Pretty Town (I admit, the names did put me slightly off). But then she meets a girl, and after becoming good friends and sneaking around behind their government's back, her friend wants to run away to stay an ugly. She tries to persuade Tally, but she refuses.
Yet, as fate would have it, the plot twists and Tally is forced to go looking for her friend after she has escaped. But Tally's future isn't as easy as 'go-there, get-her, come-back-and-turn-pretty' unfortunately.
For me, this book had the perfect amount of romance. It wasn't present at all until about halfway through the book, where we start learning about the love interest - and we don't even realise he is that until a little later. I really enjoyed this slow introduction to the character (which I will not name so you might not see it coming (for the record, I did)) and felt like I actually knew him very well before Tally kissed him or whatever. I also felt that the characters were very well managed, and the fact that there was a little unusual twist between their relationship appealed to me.
This book is very different from other Young Adult fiction in several ways; two of which I have already mentioned (being the easy romance and involvement of our own discrimination about each other). But the most obvious of which is the reasoning behind the dystopian setting. In most post-apocalyptic books, it goes almost unsaid that there was a war over power between humans (or sometimes aliens, I admit) themselves, and then one particular side won and took over. However, Uglies is based around the fact that their modern society was created in favour of making the world better - and the intentions actually genuinely to benefit the majority of humans. They left nature alone - stopping cutting trees, burning resources for fuels, hunting animals, using their skins and fur for clothing and accessories - allowing the eco-system to re-set itself. Furthermore, the reason for the main plot of the story was to prevent wars and discrimination and tensions by making everyone the same and equal. I especially liked this feature as it made the whole world of Uglies suddenly very real and believable.
I would recommend this book to pretty much anyone, especially if you're into dystopian novels, or novels that take reality and put a different spin on our society and ways of life. It's a fascinating read, I'll put it like that.
Do note, though, that the beginning, although whilst maybe not being uneventful, is slow, but I promise it does pick up by about a third of the way through.
Image Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13581049-uglies
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