Nothing is Perfect

UGLIES

SCOTT WESTERFELD

SIMON PULSE PUBLISHING

2005

FICTION

“In a world of extreme beauty, anyone normal is ugly.”


I’m a big fan of books in a series, like Harry Potter and Twilight, when I was informed of Westerfeld’s saga I jumped right to it; for his first New York Times best seller, I would say a superb job. Books about an alternative reality are always intriguing, especially when they confront everyday questions. For instance, have you ever thought you were ugly and that the world would be better if you were as pretty as your favorite celebrity? What if I told you in the secluded city that Westerfeld created you could get just that? Unless, however, you are Tally and your new best friend Shay decides she doesn’t want this and will run away. Then what?

The novel is almost like a slap in the face to our modern world. At sixteen, ever citizen is given an operation to be pretty; their only responsibility is to have a good time. The concept? To rid everyone of jealously, war, hatred, and all the “negative” qualities that makes us human.
Similar to our government, Tally and the citizens of Ugly and New Pretty Town have no idea what is going on and it takes running away to understand. You see, once Shay runs away the FBI of Tally’s town, called Special Circumstances, and their agents of supernatural individuals, Specials, blackmail Tally to get her friend back or she can’t change into a pretty. Imagine your dreams being crushed and of course you would do everything to get what you want, to life a life of fun. Tally risks her life on a journey to The Smokes, a city for runaways, Uglies; and she is opened up to a world of history, one her school never told her about.

It’s good to be not only educated about your history but everyone’s history. What you want might not entirely be the right thing for you, how can you decide until you know all of the details? Feelings of being trapped, complications of love, betrayal, risk, and sacrifices are just some of the occurrences Tally encounters.

A couple things did bother me though. The novel didn’t suck me in until about one hundred fifty pages in, the beginning of the story is the building friendship between two Uglies, Shay and Tally, but that gets thrown out of the window once they reunite – why have them work so hard at this friendship for it to end. Especially…the downfall of our society…to Love, Shay’s love interest, David, whose parents were runaways, begins to lose interest in her and falls for Tally.
Also, seeing as we are forced to like the protagonist, when she arrives at this new city of Uglies, we expect her to call the Specials to come get her out of there, get the job done, but no…it’s not that easy of course. The antagonist, Dr. Cable, who is pretty much in charge of the operations, is obviously crazy for trying to hold all the power and maintain balance in the world.

This page-turner will not do you wrong and keep you intrigued, it is one of the books that you tell yourself, “Just one more chapter,” as your fighting yourself out of sleep – well for me anyway. Oh, did I mention that of course there is controversy and of course everything is not perfect as the Specials want the Pretties to seem?

What’s to come: Pretties, Specials, and Extras – the complete saga. – (won’t be as much summary more pointing things out.)