Matched by Ally Condie

Title: Matched

Author: Ally Condie

Published: November 30, 2010 by Dutton

Pages: 384

ISBN: 9780525423645

Source: ARC from Around The World Tours

Description: 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.

I Give This ..  

I'm probably not the first not the first to say this (and won't be the last), but Delirium by Lauren Oliver and Matched are to similar to be released so close together.  But, I'm sure publishing companies think that dystopian fiction is the next big this after the huge success of The Hunger Games series.   And I've noticed that how much you enjoy them seems to depend on the order you read them.  I still really enjoyed Matched.

Condie does a fantastic job with world building in this novel.  So much so that it was my biggest problem with the story.  I honestly did not like the world she created.  I think my reasons revolve around the fact that I'm not sure why it was this way.  Both The Hunger Games and Delirium (and even Uglies) gave reasoning behind the government in place.  I wanted to know what happened that it was this way.  It might have helped me accept that people had to die on their 80th birthday.  Or that a person was only allowed to learn what was in their skill set and nothing more.  I also didn't like the 100 items things.  I can't imagine only knowing 100 specific things from history, or having only 100 classic books, poems, music, etc.  As much as it bothered me, it also intrigued me.  I thought it was a terrifying idea.

The characters are outstanding.  It's amazing how much Cassia changes throughout the book.  It also interesting to see how the little seeds of rebellion are all ready planted all around her.  All this slowly comes to the surface as you (and the characters) realize how diabolical the government really is.  And, how low they will stoop to keep everything in control.  I like Ky.  But, I wasn't drawn to him the way Cassie was.  It's really hard to enjoy a story when the entire time you want her to pick the other guy.  I loved Xander.  He may not have anything more than her best friend until they were matched, but he proved time and time again how loyal he was to her. 

But, I don't think dystopian fiction fans will be disappointed in this novel.  I wasn't.