Warning: Review contains spoilers.

The next step beyond drivers' licenses and credit cards: a personal bar code tattooed to your wrist.

The government, the media, food production, schools, the internet, pretty much everything you can think is controlled by one corporation - Global-1 - and now they want to control people, too. The bar code tattoos are the next big thing, making everything from hospital visits to shopping transactions that much easier. But how do you know what information is in your file, who has access to it, and what they do with it?

I had high expectations for this book, both from what I had heard about it and from the description I read. Unfortunately, instead of being a tense SF book, halfway through it turned into a weird mix of paranormal and science fiction that just didn't mesh well. Throw in some bad science (the old "we only use a small percentage of our brains" rubbish and some fundamental misconceptions about adaptation and evolution) and it was hard to know quite what to think.

The basic premis is solid and the story could be fantastic: Kayla is about to turn 17 - the age when people are first allowed to get the bar code tattoo - but she isn't excited about it. When her parents got theirs, suddenly her dad's job went south as he was passed over for expected raises and promotions, and he started getting depressed and drinking. Her mom became irritable and distant. Everyone Kayla knows who gets the tattoo seems to change, or something to do with them changes.

Kayla eventually discovers that the bar codes contain, among other things, a person's genetic information: her dad's file contains references to potential for scizophrenia, depression, and alcoholism, and obviously his employer had access. She also learns that her mom - a maternity nurse - had discovered that "genetically inferior" children were being killed before they even left the ward. Kayla refuses to have the tattoo and joins Decode, the resistance movement.

Sounds interesting, doesn't it? Right up until they bring in the telepathy and telekenesis and premenotions, the Native American shaman, and the people trying to contact aliens with their minds. These things drastically decrease the effect of the story, as well as bringing up the previously mentioned bad science. "Adaptation" and "evolution" don't happen in a few years (or even less) simply because people don't live with the rest of society anymore, and they don't happen to individual people anyway. And we already use all of our brains.

Overall, I was disappointed with this book. A story that could have been very interesting and address real issues being faced today got lost in the pseudoscience and mysticism, which was jarring and seemed out of context. I will not be rereading or recommending this book. ( )

The Bar Code Tattoo is a series about a girl named Kayla (Yay, finally a main character with my name) that is set in the future. Everyone is made to get a tattoo of a bar code, this bar code has everything about them in it, their money, job, even their DNA and traits (like alcoholism or mental disorders). But the bar codes seem to change people, and Kayla thinks they are breaking up her family. ( )

To me, this novel was anything but original. Hey, what would happen if the government forced us to all get tattoos that recorded all the information about us on our own skins? See what I mean? This type of novel has been done tons before. Kayla lives in a world where all seventeen-year-olds have to receive a bar code tattoo on their wrists. Of course, the huge conglomerate that owns everything in America (including the government) has included genetic information on the tattoo. Some people receive promotions at work after getting the tattoo, while others, like Kayla's dad, sink into a depression and kill themselves. Basically, the insurance companies are weeding out the weak while giving the strong a chance to improve. Kayla joins an underground movement headed up to the mountains to resist the Party and strengthen their own natural powers. For while the government has been trying to control evolution, nature has been honing Kayla and her friends' psychic abilities. Do I recommend this book? Um, no, not really. But I had it on the plane so had to finish it. ( )

this is another on of my favorite books cause it tells the futrue and its about when people get this tattoo it lets them have a nice couple of years then they get all mad and kill them selfs or there life is hell. but i thought its my seconds favorite book. i think that people will like this book.

I like this book there weren't any slow parts that I can rememeber. It was a whole lot better then what I thought it would be