I looked at this book 3 times before I ended up getting it.
I was annoyed that one of the characters names was Xander.
It seemed typical, and I SO hate typical.
But....
I am VERY glad I read this book.
Here's the official:
Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her: what to read, what to watch, what to believe. So when Xander's face appears on-screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows with complete certainty that he is her ideal mate . . . until she sees Ky Markham's face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black.
The Society tells her it's a glitch, a rare malfunction, and that she should focus on the happy life she's destined to lead with Xander. But Cassia can't stop thinking about Ky, and as they slowly fall in love, Cassia begins to doubt the Society's infallibility and is faced with an impossible choice: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she's known and a path that no one else has dared to follow.
This is a fascinating storyline. The main character, Cassia, has this uncertainty that is SO believable, but she does something that is EXACTLY what I love about a main character.
She practices rebellion.
You see the bubble on the cover? In every aspect of this book she is trapped and she has always accepted it. Not because it's futile, but because she doesn't realize she is even trapped.
You see the bubble on the cover? In every aspect of this book she is trapped and she has always accepted it. Not because it's futile, but because she doesn't realize she is even trapped.
But then she realizes.... and she starts to fight back.
What fascinated me even more, was when I reached the end of the book, I realized that there really weren't that many things that had HAPPENED in the book.
You take a book like the Hunger Games, and there's a battle and struggle on every page - people dying, deception, EVENTS taking place.
In this book though, the author managed to reel me in JUST AS MUCH, with way less action.
And that my friends, is good writing.
