The Selection by Kiera Cass
When I found
Shatter Me I also found this book.
Except the ebook wasn't available so I put it on hold.
And I was impatient!! The summary had me hooked!
Cue a few days later I'm headed on a two and half hour drive to see my boyfriend for NYE.
The idea of an audio book popped in my head.
I am previously not a fan.
I was accidentally put on hold for the audio (CD's ughhh. hahaha.) version of The Hunger Games, I started them that way until the book came in and I promptly started over.
I have a hard time concentrating on an audio book, I think faster than anyone can speak.
I tend to get sidetracked and sometimes even bored, I also love to reread passages.
I decided an audio book was worth a try for the drive, and even though I didn't like it.
I will absolutely do it again for every trip back to school from now on.
This book made me a better driver!!!
I get bored and tired driving (I make the exact same 2.5 hour trip sometimes 6 or 8 times a month) and I turn to my phone to keep me engaged (you'll think less of me if I crash because I was on my phone, but I'll feel better about myself because it wasn't because I fell asleep at the wheel)
But this book being on kept me off my phone, (I couldn't even concentrate on a simple text I was so engaged) and kept my eyes on the road!!!
Audio book for the win!
There are absolutely some major and I mean MAJOR drawbacks to an audio book.
Which I wont be able to overlook toooo often.
A major one in my book is there is no obvious distinction in a audio book when an author leaves half a page blank or leaves a line in between two paragraphs to show distinction between scenes.
To be quite honest I swear the reader only mentioned half the chapter numbers. I was forever getting lost and having to just go with it to figure it out.
One of the other things that I find annoying about audios is that you can't always tell what someone is saying.
For example the male lead in this books name is Maxon but I was hearing Maxin and it may not matter but I had no idea how it was spelled and it bothered me.
There was also a girl named Kriss in the book which is pretty and maybe feminine and lends itself to certain picture in my head.
But it what pronounced just like regular old Chris and I was thrown off at first and then thought ughh every time I hear it (many of the names in this book could be considered exotic and Kriss might be but Chris is not, I couldn't figure out why her name didn't fit in).
Because a human reads the book and not a computer there are also regular words that aren't pronounced the way I'm used to hearing and I would get annoyed.
I am a very visual person, and as a general rule when I read a movie is playing in my head, the reader voices for characters and dramatizations totally threw off my mental movie.
Aside from all the things I didn't like about it being an audio book I loved the actual book itself.
The summary says it takes place in a
dystopian world.
(that's a link to the Wikipedia definition page)
If that's what it means then I officially have a name for the sub-genre of books that I like.
It's just like Shatter Me in that aspect. Post new governmental takeover.
Short synopsis:
The Selection takes place post/during the fourth world war. I know right?!?!?! EEECK!!!
The country is no longer the USA and no longer a democracy. The calendar is different.
Lots of things are different, the most glaring is the return of casts and the cast system.
They use a cast system that is numbered one through eight and you are your number.
Each number has a list of professions it can pursue and there are no other options.
There is a royal family, a King and Queen, with princes and princesses (the current family only has a prince).
The Selection is a lottery used to provide a wives for the princes of the country.
The lottery produces 35 ladies for the Prince to weed down to one.
America Singer is begrudgingly part of the selection.
As a five her family could use the money that the selection guarantees her but she isn't interested in becoming the princess, because after all, she has a boyfriend.
She is convinced to enter because she knows there is no way she would get chosen.
Miraculously she gets chosen and her life changes over night.
^ Those are the crappiest four lines I've ever written, but what else can I say.
A huge part of the excitement of this book is figuring out some of what I've already told you, about the country and the casts, how the selection works.
This book is fantastic and don't let a less than stellar description of it deter you.
There are rebels, and love, makeovers, and new clothes, there are friendships, and girls with motives, a made up history lesson, a Prince, and 35 girls from which he must choose only one to marry.
There are also four more books, two in the trilogy and two novellas, one between each main book.
I have read the first novella and started the second book.
I will review the novellas together at the end.
In looking up the authors website I found out that there is another novella and a fourth book!!! (that's seven books total)
(It's funny the author is actually how I picture America in my head, when in reality, she probably looks more like me, red curly hair and blue eyes, mine aren't really blue but people insist that they are. I think I must be thinking of America Ferrera.)
So it's not technically a trilogy anymore.
In March a book will be released with all three novellas, a few extra scenes from another point of view, and some other bonus features.
Credit:
Amazon - in case you're into buying
Kiera Cass - author website
Read A-likes:
The Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Divergent Trilogy - Veronica Roth
Shatter Me Trilogy - Taherah Mafi
Read on.
Jessica.
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