For today's Books I did not finish post I will be featuring yet another series, I'm starting to think that I should just rename this whole segment as 'Series I Did Not Finish'. Because I don't tend to read a whole lot of standalone novels, and I'd usually try to finish reading a book if it's a standalone. But when it's part of a series, and I already don't like where the the story is heading by the end of book one, then well, I guess to me it deserves to be here.
However when it comes to this particular series, I'm probably in the minority when it comes to my opinion on this books plot.
Uglies
by
Scott Westerfeld
Tagline: In a world of extreme beauty, anyone normal is ugly.
Okay I'm just going to get this out of the way now because it has nothing to do with why I never picked up the other books in this series. But that thing above 'UGLIES' really pisses me off. Why the need to act like it's a death match between YA dystopian books? And anyway this book is nothing like The Hunger Games, so whether Uglies came before it or not, it's not in the same league, we all know that it's only there to drag in The Hunger Games fans, so if that's you take this warning, it isn't anything like the Hunger Games so don't go into this thinking that it will be similar, the only similar thing that could been as being similar is that it is a YA dystopia.
Rant Over. On to the review.
As always I will give you a synopsis of this book,
"Tally can't wait to turn sixteen and become Pretty. Sixteen is the magic number that brings a transformation 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 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."
This maybe the one and only time I have read a Dystopian novel and actually wanted the perceived 'bad guys' to win! I felt it was a cop out, you had such an exciting world and so much story you could tell about the world the Pretty's live in but instead we get a glimpse of the old world, and a whole lot of boring about the 'good guys' fighting back living on the outside, not conforming blah blah blah boring, take me back to prettyville please I beg you!
Honestly I probably skim read most of the book, Tally was pretty superficial and extremely annoying, she goes from desperately wanting to be Pretty seeing her friend again the guy she has a crush on to, disliking the Pretty's and loving David instead. I just had no time for the girl in the end, she just got on my nerves.
What let's the books down is pacing, it's like trying to keep pace with a turtle it just didn't catch my interest and I found it increasingly difficult to not flick a couple of pages ahead to see what happened.
Also, and this is slightly my fault, I will admit that, I had read A LOT of dystopian books before I picked up this one. Even though this came before most of those, it's just not as good, it has nothing on my beloved Divergent by Veronica Roth which is fast paced and punchy and actually focuses on the exciting group within the dystopian society. So it failed ultimately were others that came after it succeeded, so I have no interest in finishing it because honestly even if I did have the second book on hand I probably wouldn't read it.
It was too slow to suck you in to make you crave more to want to know what happens next. If you want a good example take Insurgent by Veronica Roth it came out over a year ago, and the last book in the series isn't due for release for a few more months yet I am clamouring and desperate to get my hands on it. I will be heading to the book store on the day of release to get Allegiant. Uglies is not a book I would read more than once, it isn't captivating, it's slow and boring and just sits mostly forgotten on my bookshelf now. Which is a shame because it had a very promising premise that just failed to deliver for me.
I scored this book 3/5. It takes a lot for me to give a book a bad/mediocre rating.
That's all for today I hope you enjoyed this post and I shall see you all on Wednesday!
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