Guest Review: Matched by Ally Condie

Title:  Matched
Author:  Ally Condie
Number of Pages:  366
Genre:  Fiction, Young Adult, Dystopian
Publisher/Year:  Dutton Books / 2010
To Be Released:  November 2010
Source:  Advanced Reading Copy
Rating:  5/5


Why I Read It:  It was recommended by a friend and I am grateful for her recommendation.
                                                                                   
First Impression: 


I love book covers, and how they are able to draw readers to the story waiting on the inside.  This cover is fabulous! The shimmer of the background almost makes the “globe” appear in 3-D.  I truly wanted to get inside the book so I could experience, for myself, Cassia’s Society.  I do wish the diameter of the “globe” was equally “Matched” to the title.  I think that would create even more of a first impressive physical draw to the book.

Quote:

“Cassia.  Do you regret your decision to be Matched?  Do you wish that you chosen to be single?”

“That’s not it.”

“Then what is it?”

I think people should be able to choose who they Match with,” I say lamely.

“Where would it end, Cassia?” she says, her voice patient.  “Would you say next that people should be able to choose how many children they have, and where they want to live? Or when they want to die?”

I am silent, but not because I agree.  I am thinking of Grandfather.  Do not go gentle.

Synopsis:


In the Society, Officials decide. Who you love. Where you work. When you die.
Cassia has always trusted their choices. It’s barely any price to pay for a long life, the perfect job, the ideal mate. So when her best friend appears on the Matching screen, Cassia knows with complete certainty that he is the one . . . until she sees another face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black. Now Cassia is faced with impossible choices: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she’s known and a path no one else has ever dared follow—between perfection and passion.


Matched is a story for right now and storytelling with the resonance of a classic. (From the back cover of the Advanced Reading Copy.)

Brief Review:


Seventeen year old Cassia is able to establish, from the beginning, that though her Society is supposed to be perfect, there are flaws.  I appreciate her ability to try to abide by the governing rules because of her love:  love for her family, and love for both Xander, her Match, and Ky her passion; though she is rogue enough to question the many rules in her Society.  She knew the decisions she made, in every avenue of her life, would effect every person in her life; thus her dilemna.  Should she accept her “perfect Match” and ease this match provides or should she follow her heart and her passion?


The emotional romances in this love story are charged with intensity.  Condie did an excellent job presenting the development of every character and this allowed me to make strong emotional bonds with each person.  I wanted to know more, to experience more, to share more, and to not have the story end. I couldn’t put the book down, and I am already waiting for the next book in this story.


Created by Deb Vosler, Phy. Ed. teacher and avid reader