Specials

"Special Circumstances." Those words send shivers down the spine. Often thought of as a boogy man or merely rumors to scare young children into behaving. That is until Tally finds herself as one of them. Now as a Special she is fiercely beautiful, a superb fighting machine, ready to protect the city and all it stands for. The strength, the speed, the clarity of focus... yet why is she plagued by questions? Why this nagging doubt that not all is quite right? The doubts are easy to ignore until she's given the opportunity to stamp out the New Smoke once and for all. Now the question is does she listen to that tiny voice or carry out her mission as programed?

Specials is the third in the Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld. The story takes show more off and doesn't let go! It is action packed throughout and quite a wild ride. We rejoin Tally about a month after where book two leaves off. After becoming Special everything is more intense for Tally and that definitely comes through in the new descriptions. I have enjoyed how Westerfeld keeps giving us new insight into the world he has created simply by changing the tone of the writing through Tally's different stages.

Tally is really put through the wringer in this book. Physically, mentally, emotionally, she experiences it all. Her entire personality shift from Uglies to now is amazing, both at how she starts off acting as she is "supposed" to and then how her underlying personality fights to break through those barriers.

Some of the themes this time around take a disturbing turn. The idea behind the Cutters in particular is concerning and sometimes painful. Yet it remains fairly realistic in the depiction of the psychology behind the act.

While the ending is not exactly happy, there is hope. I found this to book to be a great read and good ending to the trilogy. show less

If you run a repressive society, give its youth a chance to rebel, and recruit the successful rebels to your watchdogs who keep the society. While you're at it, make them cyborgs with superhuman abilities, even if they're still teenagers. What could go wrong?

Tally Youngblood has been drafted into the Specials: the elite who work for Special Circumstances, the guardians of the fabric of her unpleasant society. Her ability to break out of her society's conditioning qualifies her for the job-- but what happens when her own goals don't fit with those of the people running society?

The trouble that ensues is depicted well: the young heroine is playing a significant role, but it's clear that there are a lot of other people doing the heavy show more lifting of a rebellion, mostly off-screen. show less

I almost wanted to go back and re-evaluate the first 2 parts. I realized what it is that bugs me in these books. Tally really doesn't have much of agency. Things just kind of happen to her and all cute/smartest/coolest guys just fall for her for no reason. You never really learn anything interesting about the characters and basically the same story is told 3 times in the 3 books. I think what kept me reading was the style which kept things going, but I would say this was more of a plot driven (vs. character driven) book, but even for that there wasn't enough of a plot. Or maybe I think there really can't be a good plot, if the characters are not good. Also The whole David/Tally/Zane thing just seemed really forced and I didn't feel that show more there was any true feeling with either of the boys. And in the end, I just didn't like Tally very much. I would've loved to hear more about Shay, I thought she was much more interesting. show less

What an incredible end to the series! I will admit, it left me a little wanting, but I think that's part of the point. We fill in what's left with what we've learned from the series.

Tally becoming a Special was, from the story's standpoint, incredible. Watching her go from a bubbly little pretty to a programmed fighting machine was really cool, and at the same time, gave me the heebie-jeebies! From Tally's standpoint though, it was a horrible thing to have happen. She's now programmed to destroy the place and people she truly loves.

I won't spoil the story, so I'm going to stop here. If you've read the first two books, you've got to read this one! It's amazing. If you haven't read the series yet, you should, because it's one you'll show more never forget, and I bet you'll never look at yourself the same way again (in a good way). show less

Every time I picked up a new Uglies book, I wouldn't think that it could possibly be better than the last one. And then it would be. So perhaps by default because it is the last book in the series (sans Extras of course), Specials is definitely my favorite one. I have loved this series for such a long time, and it has always been my favorite dystopian world (yes, I love it even more than Divergent and The Hunger Games, which is saying a lot). It is just so intriguing, and so closely resembles the world we live in today (even back when I was in middle school and read this for the first time I could recognise that) that frankly, its a little terrifying. Scott Westerfeld writes it so well that I felt it would be almost natural to fall into show more this world and live as if nothing was wrong, but then you come out of your bubble and realise how messed up the world you live in is. I am grateful that the various movie deals it always seems to have never pull through, because then I would have to share this series and I just don't want to do that. show less

I have such mixed emotions about this book. It was originally supposed to be the final book in a trilogy, although there is now a fourth book in which Tally appears as a non-central character. So, even though this ended up not being the final book, it is really the final book in which Tally is forefront. Because of that, the ending felt a little unfinished for what was in essence the end of her story. But then again, those imperfect endings are a reality of life.

Tally was also a lot less likeable in this book. This is not because of a lack of character development, but rather the fact that her character has undergone some extreme changes within her story arc. Her character has changed so much across the course of the three books to show more date. In the first, she was an Ugly, full of humanity as we know it. In Pretties, she was changed into a Pretty and her personality changed with it. Even when things changed for her, her personality was never really as it had once been. And now, as a Special, she is nothing as she once was. Her humanity is almost entirely gone, more cyborg than human.

The plot was extremely action-packed and there were some fantastic twists and turns throughout the story. Like the other books, there was romance, but it wasn't the central focus of the plot. That is something that I generally appreciate, although even I hoped for a little more. But I suppose romance is difficult when one has virtually no humanity.

The one thing that drove me insane for most of the novels was some of the vernacular. Emotion words are changed a bit and the style was fairly annoying at first, until I realized the reasons for that linguistic twist. Emotions are expressed as "bubbly" or "happy-making" or "fear-making." Even among the Pretties, emotions are less inherent and more manufactured. There is a distance between the Pretties and truly feeling emotion and the language really supports that.

Despite my misgivings about the ending, it is still an engaging read. One of the things I love most about these novels is that the author doesn 't neatly tie everything up into happily ever afters. There might be happiness or resolutions, but they aren't complete. There is still failure, destruction, death, disappointment, and loss. Life never has a perfectly happy ending and the author isn't afraid of showing that. Bittersweet emotions are a fact of life.

My Recommendation: I love this series! I love that these books make you think about your own values and beliefs, about the world we live in. Such a great thing! I gave it 4.5 mugs! show less

ok. so on top of all the other stuff i have been reading lately, i became thoroughly engrossed in a series which has not let me down in the slightest. this is a bit long winded, but keep in mind it is in reference to reading three books.. and i am trying REALLY hard not to give away spoilers..

it is hard to write about this book because in the context of the review, the keywords and mannerisms of the characters society seems like nothing but grammar and spelling errors. bear with it though, in the books, you are so washed over with the word use and logic that it actually makes sense in the proper frame.

the Uglies trilogy (now a quadrilogy?) was very engrossing. Book one, Uglies, describes a world where there is no war. there is no show more famine, hatred, or turmoil. 200-300 years in the past over population, strip mining, clear cutting, genetic engineering of plants and animals laid waste on everything in the world. humans have rebuilt from the ashes after we destroyed ourselves. our generation is referred to as “the rusties” since everything left from our world is covered in rust and falling apart.

Tally Youngblood is 15 years old, and only months away from becoming one of the “pretties”. in this world, to remove all of the dangerous human habits of destruction, you are born and raised by your parents, once you hit a certain age (8 or 9 from what i could tell) you are shipped off to school as an ugly. at the age of 16 you are taken from school where you will be put under the knife and remade as a better person. your bones are ground down and or elongated, you have new muscle tissue added to your body, and you have full facial re-constructive surgery. all “pretties” have a choice on how they look, with in the guidelines of the governments rules of morphology. they effectively remove all extremes in height, hair color, skin color, etc. everyone is similar and there is no need for hatred.

Tally, in waiting for her 16th birthday meets a new friend, Shay, who has no desire to become one of the pretties. a week before their shared birthday/graduation from being uglies, Shay decides to run off to a rumored group of rebels who have shafted the system and stayed ugly, and foregone all efforts to work within the system. Tally however has no desire to join her friend and sticks around for her surge (surgery). her only desire is become pretty and join her friends in New Pretty town, where she can dance and play and enjoy the life she has been programmed to want since birth.

Unfortunately, Tally is roped into a game of social change. she is scooped up by the fearsome and dangerous police force that acts as bogeymen for the government. Special Circumstances (the Specials) only comes forward when needed, generally letting the local police force take care of everything. This being a “Special circumstance” Tally is forced to follow her friend to the encampment of rebels (the Smoke) and betray her friend, and everyone who has escaped so far. if she does not, she will be denies surge and will forever be Ugly. and in this society, this is the worst thing that could ever happen to you.

Book one was so good, that i had an itch to move on to book two immediately. i hate doing that. i love to stretch a series out if possible, and draw out the enjoyment from the story line. so when book one was finished, though i really wanted to move on to the second book, i ramped myself down and read the Real Ultimate Power: The Official Ninja book. Book two immediately followed and when finished i lost all self control and my fingers and eyes forced me to read book three next.. it took about two days with my schedule.. two lousy days.. why couldn’t it last longer… i wasted a great book by reading it too soon..

well, not a waste. damn. it was so good, i had no choice really.. it was in my best interest to read the book. or so i keep telling myself. there is a fourth book. it was written after the trilogy was announced, so it is a bit of an anomaly, thus the trilogy quadrilogy notation above. unfortunately, the book Extras is still in hardback edition, so until it hits paperback, i will have to force myself to wait.. this sucks..

these books, written by Scott Westerfeld, fall into the teen-fiction category. they are written for teens, but the story line and books themselves do not lend themselves only to teens. being thirty years old, i literally could not stop reading these books. if you need a good break from your normal reading schedule, i would throw these in the mix and read them. they all rank around 300 pages of single space small print, so they are not some little read you would use to sturdy the kitchen table. instead, they are full of vibrant ideas, technology, tattoos that i wish were a reality. there were no obvious plot twists that made me think “why am i reading this” or “how predictable” instead, i was often surprised and left feeling “bubbly” as they state in the book.

imagine a world full of barbie dolls being slowly destroyed by barbie’s cyber-punk kid sister that has been kept in the closet for years.

i was sad to come to the end of this series, but glad to know that i will have at least one more book to close it all up in the near future.

anyone who is interested should note that all three of the first books can be bought in a boxed set for under 20 bucks.. this is how i got sucked into them.. a really good price for a nice story line idea turned into one of the best purchases i have made on books in a while. now, i just have to hope that hollywood has not gotten their hands on the thought of movies. these would be thoroughly ruined and not done justice.. read them before someone fucks them up for you… thats all i have to say on the matter. show less