Matched - A Review

Matched - Ally Condie (Library Thing)

Product Details

• Pub. Date: November 2010
• Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
• Format: Hardcover , 384pp
• Sales Rank: 146
• Age Range: Young Adult

• ISBN-13: 9780525423645
• ISBN: 0525423648

Synopsis

Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her: what to read, what to watch, what to believe. So when Xander's face appears on-screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows with complete certainty that he is her ideal mate . . . until she sees Ky Markham's face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black.

The Society tells her it's a glitch, a rare malfunction, and that she should focus on the happy life she's destined to lead with Xander. But Cassia can't stop thinking about Ky, and as they slowly fall in love, Cassia begins to doubt the Society's infallibility and is faced with an impossible choice: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she's known and a path that no one else has dared to follow.

My Thoughts:

Can you imagine being told who you would marry, how you would live, what job you would have and just about everything else is decided for you as well? Being censored from most everything in the world. Movies, music, poems, books all gone except for a very few? A life with no free will whatsoever? This is the life Cassia lives and she accepts it until that fateful night she looks at her matching microchip and see's two boys.

This book brought about many feelings for me. Sadness and joy being two of them. I felt such a sadness for the characters in this book. I wondered if they even knew what real happiness really was. Everyone is the same. Day to day life it the same, nothing unexpected until the unexpected happens and Cassia's life is slowly brought to life. Watching Cassia go from drone to learning to live and love was beautiful. The sadness followed me through out the book but I couldn't stop reading because with all the sadness one thing shined through, hope.

Ally references a well known Dylan Thomas poem, Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, several times in this book and it brought back just how much I love this poem. How it seems sad but yet no where near sad, all at the same time. How it teaches you question things, life, etc. Not to just go by what they tell you to. But to grab life by the horns and live it!

I have to say I loved this book and if you are a fan of Dystopian fiction, I highly recommend it!

Author's Website: Ally Condie