Matched By Ally Condie
I bet you weren't expecting another book review so soon, maybe you were, but I don't know how many people are reading my blog right now, it might just be me. I am expecting to do a couple of blog layout changes again shortly, but I couldn't resist another review.
A good friend of mine Sis M. in our branch recommended this book to me and couldn't get it into my hands fast enough, except for the fact that she had already leant the book out to someone else. (BUMMER!) Fortunately, it was like a ghost haunting me or something because I would see it in the bookstore and be instantly drawn to it.
I had actually read another book by Ally Condie, she had written a series for LDS youth and I picked up the first one in the series and it was a super quick read as well. I didn't realize that they were one in the same until I had read her bio on her website. It was like, NOW I DEFINATELY NEED TO READ MATCHED!
So on with the Book Review!
So in this society, the society has picked the age limit on all human beings will be. There are also age requirements set on each person (when to meet their mate, when they will marry, when they will die, etc.) The society has also done away with handwriting and they now deal with more technologically advanced communication.
So the book sets out with Cassia a 16 year old girl going to a Match banquet where she will find out who her soul mate is. (wouldn't we all like to know when we're 16 years old!) She gets matched and finds out that her match is none other than her best friend Xander. She's suprised and so is he. They both feel fortunate that they found one another without officially being matched!
She is sent home with a port card -match card that has all the information about Xander on it (most of it she already knows) and the rules and regulations on "courting" and "dating" and making their match official in marriage at 21. When she loads it into her computer Xander's face shows up and then flashes off and another guys face shows up, and apparently she knows him too! His name is Ky.
So Cassia has to then decide what is the right thing for her in this society. Unfortunately this society is also breaking down around her. She is given a work placement to sort things people, places, things, numbers, etc. Her recreation time is limited to certain activities (swimming, planting, hiking) and everyone is constantly being watched for probably what would be the "supreme" beings of society. During this time she becomes more and more confused as to who to pick to be matched to, helping her family, and the community she lives in, while she properly follows orders, even though she constantly questions them, she even gets taught by Ky the skill of handwriting which was hidden and covered so no one knew what they were doing.
This book definately leaves you wanting more. It is worth every word on it's page.
As a side note, I don't know what the other books in the series will be like but It was relatively tame "teen" fiction respects, no big violence, no innapropriate language or vulgarity, no sexual situations. It may change in the later books, it may not. (I may write a post about the Hunger Games series and Twilight Series, to show you what I mean) It was an honest telling of a story that invites you to talk about "what would happen if...?"
Read it! It is Excellent!
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