Top O’ The Morning, Bookworms!
You knew I couldn’t read just one book of a trilogy, right? Even if it wasn’t my favorite? Sooo… Let’s talk about Crossed!
At the end of Matched, Ky is shipped off to the Outer Provinces, Cassia’s family is relocated, and Xander is left at the homestead being all brokenhearted and whatnot. Cassia finagles her way into a work camp. Her plan is to hunt Ky down in the Outer Provinces. Because, you know. Putting your life on the line for a boy you’ve kissed once is a BRILLIANT idea. (Sorry. Angry feminist moment. I’m just really OVER young girls doing stupid things for “love.”)
Persons unknown are trying to blow up The Society. Whoever this enemy is, they’ve already killed off all the real inhabitants of the Outer Provinces, and The Society is trying to pretend they’ve got a disposable population. Ky is sent here and realizes what’s going on. Fortunately, he grew up in the area and manages to escape with two compadres.
Cassia shows up in Ky’s village a few days after he’s disappeared. Not to be outdone in the “I can survive in the wild” contest, Cassia takes her new pal Indie (who seems to have developed a major crush on Xander, despite never having met him) and runs off into some geologic oddity (they refer to it as “the carving.”) Y’all remember in Son, the final book of The Giver series where Claire spends a crap ton of time scaling a cliff? Yeah. They do that too. Anyway, they all wander around and the groups connect and everybody learns a lot about The Rising (AKA The Society’s opposition.) After a lot of walking and talking and theorizing, we finally meet some members of The Rising. The reader is left to ponder whether The Rising is really any better than The Society. Dun dun dun!!!
Are any of you South Park fans? I won’t judge you one way or the other. I don’t watch regularly, but there’s an episode of South Park where every time a new plot point is introduced, someone pops up and yells, “Simpsons did it!” The whole time I was reading this I kept thinking, “The Giver did it! The Hunger Games did it!”
I’m probably being too hard on this series. It’s hard to find something truly original anymore, especially in such a prolific genre. I was chatting with my pal June about this, and we agreed that the society in Matched is a whole lot more believable than many that have been described before. Aside from having limited choices, being in the Society is pretty sweet. You get all of your meals delivered to you. You don’t have to worry about what you want to be when you grow up. You don’t even have to worry about finding the love of your life because the Match program sounds pretty doggone successful at putting together happy marriages. It’s a lot more believable that people would submit to this sort of a society and not riot constantly than it is to believe in a society where an oppressive regime starves its citizens and forces their children to fight to the death for sport…
What do you think, Bookworms? Am I being to much of a curmudgeon, or should I cut this series some slack?
Quirky Chrissy
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! That episode is the best! Sea Men! I’m not a huge South Park fan, but this was one of the good episodes. Ha! On that note, I probably will not be reading this book.
Words for Worms
Hahaha I thought of you when looking for this clip and your South Park phase.
Ashley F
I think you’re right in that it’s hard to find something TRULY original in the teen genre. It’s been dominated by vampires and witches and shape-shifters and angels for way too long. I don’t mind not having a truly original setting or concept as long as I can get behind the characters. Weak characters are the one thing I hate the most.
Words for Worms
Maybe that’s why I’m wishy washy. Cassia is going a bit Bella Swan on me…
Ashley F
Aw crap. That sucks. I”ll let you know when I read the first one.
bookrockbetty
hahaha love this post. you are not being too hard on it. that was one of the worst series i’ve ever read. 🙂
Words for Worms
Ha! I’m working through Reached now. I can’t stop. I’ll reserve final judgement until the conclusion, but… Just… Seriously a plague? OMFG.
ashley
I fell ya on this Katie. Although I do believe Cassia didn’t do what she did just out of that whole love thing- she’s also motivated by doing what’s she feels is right. Down with society! Lol. It was a series that was a lot like the other YA dystopia books out there though. They all have the same basic premis though don’t they? I just started Maze Runner by James Dashner. This one so far is a little different than the normal dystopia books ive read. Im not sure how much different you would feel about Divergent then. Its a lot like all the rest (with some different twists)
Words for Worms
I don’t know. Is the heroine kind of badass or does she run around being dumb about her love life? I think I might like it too just because it’s set in Chicago and I’m familiar with the city so I might be all “ooooh Sears Tower is now a prison!” or whatever. “Willis Tower” my foot.
Ashley F
I liked Divergent but didn’t love the sequel as much which makes me kinda worried about the 3rd book.
ashley
Yes she’s a badass. ( i have issues wi t h her badass-ness) There’s definitely the falling in love thing in there but she’s definitely not all “ill do anything for love” kind . I definitely liked Insurgent better. Especially the end!
June
I feel like I have totally let you down with the fact that I told you that I liked this series lol. I think I just like the idea of the Society and how everything was implemented, like we talked about. The characters are kind of ehh, but they don’t bother me nearly as much as some of the characters from other books.
I hope you haven’t revoked my book-recommending privileges 🙂
Words for Worms
Oh June, don’t be silly. If I totally hated Matched I wouldn’t have finished it or read the rest of the series. The fact that I’m all bitey about it means that it was good enough to make me care about the characters and be mad at them. See? My mean is really a sign of confused affection. Your privileges are intact, never you fear.
Megan M.
Lately I’ve been pretty hard on a lot of the TV shows that I used to enjoy and I’ve started wondering whether the shows have suddenly started to suck or if I’m just in a mood where I hate everything and one day it will pass.
Also, I’m impressed by how quickly you seem to read! I’m a fast reader myself, but I have two kids and just can’t sit and read all day like I would love to (not that you don’t have other obligations, of course you do) but are you really reading these books in one day? Do you read multiple books at a time? How long does it take you to write up a post after you finish a book?
Words for Worms
I have a full time job, but sometimes I read on my lunch hour and I read in the evenings before I go to sleep. I read quite a bit on the weekends, perk of not having kids yet. I don’t typically read more than one book at a time- it makes my brain hurt. My posts? They could almost always use more editing, but I’m lazy so I usually get Monday and Tuesday’s posts ready over the weekend and then work on Thursday-Friday throughout the week. I almost never read a book in a day, and I’d basically be lost without my weekend reading time. It remains to be seen if I can keep up this blistering pace once the weather stops sucking :).
picturemereading
Not being too hard, I totally agree LOL
Words for Worms
Ha! Thanks! 🙂
Words for Worms
🙂 Excellent
Kelly
Ughhh, I really disliked Matched but I feel like a loser not reading the other two books. This review doesn’t make me optimistic, but I saw that you liked Reached a little better…hmmm…maybe worth the effort?
Words for Worms
You’re not a loser. I have a hard time not finishing series, plus I thought that being snarky might make for entertaining blog posts. If you didn’t like Matched, just cut your losses now and go read something awesome.
Rachel
I felt the same way when I was reading Crossed. Matched was ok, and I’d hoped Crossed would be an improvement, but it wasn’t. Still, I’ll read Reached eventually.
Words for Worms
Reached saved the series for me, I think you’ll appreciate the ending.
Adam Byerly
So I’m a much slower reader than y’all. I just finished this. (I only get to read a chapter or two a night, I’m to darn busy). Anyway, I gotta say Katie, that I *want* to say you were being to hard on it at this point (i know you have finished the series since, so things have changed). But I don’t know if I can. I myself, am too uncritical, I like just about everything I read, which makes me a bad critic. There were a few times in this book that I thought it was getting kind of boring, but I did like overall the view into the truly inhuman stuff going on in the outer provinces, the tougher survival conditions, and I liked the semi twist at the end where you don’t know if you can trust the Rising and having her be sent back in. Anyway, I’m taking a break to read a short non-fiction, then will finish the series. So, i’ll let you know my thoughts on Reached and the series as a whole, in, oh, about 3 months. 😛
Words for Worms
Dude, Reached saved the series for me. I think you’ll appreciate the ending. 🙂
Adam Byerly
Sweet!