Extras (edition 2007)

The unexpected 4th novel in the ‘Uglies’ series. It’s been over three years since the cure for the brain lesions was released and the world is slowly regaining what it has lost. Aya Fuse is a fifteen-year-old Japanese girl, whose one ambition in life is to be popular by “kicking” an interesting story about something important. In a world were popularity buys you everything including the best house, clothes, and friends Aya must do something great to change her mediocre life. In her search for this amazing story Aya meets up with the Sly Girls. These seemingly ordinary girls live on the wild side by riding on top of a super fast mag-lev train while trying to stay away from the kickers. Aya is forced to sacrifice her hovercam Moggle to be a part of their clique so she can gain access to their story but later rescues Moggle and uses him to unlock the greatest story every kicked. The one problem is that she got it all wrong. She has some help getting it right from her famous brother Hiro, her tech friend Ren, her boyfriend Frizz, the always-helpful David, and three of your favorite cutters and mine, Shay, Fausto, Tally. These eight people discover the truth behind the metal shortage and the inhuman “freaks” while once again trying to save themselves and the world from destruction. ( )

Meh. It's a sort of "next gen" add on to the story. I felt like he ended the trilogy a big badly, so it was nice to have a softer ending after this one, but it seemed a bit random to me. Had he ended Specials a bit kinder and left it at that, I would be more inclined to recommend the series highly. As it stands, it was just okay for me. I liked book one eventually, really enjoyed two and three, but I nearly stopped reading book four on several occasions. ( )

Maybe I should not have read this 4th book immediately after reading the first 3 books. At first I thought it could be good. I liked the way he portrayed this new world where it's all about being known. Everybody uses the internet (feed) and tries to be famous. That was interesting but I think it became all a bit too ridiculous after she did tell her big scoop and every body started to chase her. Not sure if it is the book or it is just me. Looking forward now to read something different. ( )

Enjoyed this, as I have the other books in the series. It's one of those trilogies-turned-longer things, but not badly self-indulgent with it; the choice of a different narrator and a new set of challenges helps. It zips along really well, and has some real depth to it too; the earlier books brought in questions of free will and self-determination, and this one tackles the Facebook-type culture of vapid self-promotion squarely.

Mind you, the thing I was particularly interested in was the fact that when searching for a link to this book, almost all the initial results I was getting were for forums as writ by ver kidz themselves. These are obviously books that are really grabbing the teen readers' imaginations, and probably grabbing readers who aren't the obvious will-read-anything ones. Good stuff! ( )

Compared to the first three, not as good. not even close. ( )