VVMBookBlog

Tally Youngblood is about to turn 16 and is looking forward to the “surge” (surgery) that will take away her supposed ugliness and allow here to move to Party Towers in New Pretty Town with the rest of the “pretties.” But then she meets Shay who is questioning the need to conform and reveals to Tally about her secret friends who live in the distant area called Smoke, especially David. And she tries to convince Tally to escape to the Smoke with her.

Just as Tally is about to undergo the life-changing surgery, she is whisked off to the officials in Special Circumstances who force her to lead them to Shay and the rebels living in the Smoke in exchange for her having the surgery to become a “pretty.” And now I can’t tell you any more except that her journey on hoverboard to the Smoke leads her to some pretty interesting people and some disturbing information about what really happens to the people who undergo the surgery to become a pretty. Interesting also are the comments about the Rusties–the people who once inhabited the area where the Smoke is now. Turns out the Rusties were the people who used up all the resources of the land until they became extinct themselves. Hmmm…now who would those people be??

Find out how Tally deals with being a spy among the people of the Smoke. Then go on to the sequels–Pretties and Specials. My first (very uninformed) impression of these books was that they were trying to appeal to some very shallow interests of student readers. And I was wrong! There’s SO much to think about, discuss and imagine what we would do in similar circumstances.

I think we’re going to need more copies of these books!