Inside Out

The scrubs have it rough. They work strenuous, boring jobs in 10 hour shifts. The food is slop (and not only that but the same slop over and over). There is no personal space. Trella escapes this cramped lifestyle by mostly remaining in the pipes, which she cleans as her profession. She explores every inch of Inside and knows it better than anyone, earning her the nickname Queen of the Pipes. This moniker also references her somewhat haughty and distant attitude. She has one friend, Cog, a guy full of hope that Gateway, the way to Outside really exists. When the next in a succession of prophets claims he can find the answer, Trella does not believe him, but decides to fetch the discs he hid to prove him a fraud. Only...he might not show more be.

Trella made a pretty good main character for me. She is not really the heroine sort, but she was someone I could very much identify with and understand the motivations of. She is one of the least trusting people and quite antisocial. Quite unexpectedly, she finds herself the leader of a revolution, someone people look up to and help in any way possible. The attention and the role are not something she relishes, but something she must learn how to deal with.

It was really awesome to watch her grow a little bit as a person throughout the book. Although I liked her growth, I also appreciated the plodding nature of it. Some characters change so fast in novels right at the very end; this change is much more natural and complete with setbacks. As a result of Trella's self-absorption, none of the other characters is all that well flushed out. Still, I think that is acceptable in the circumstances. And I do want to see more of some of the characters.

The dystopian society was pretty interesting, especially in the construction of the hierarchy. I don't really want to give anything away, but it definitely makes you think about the impressions one has of the lives of others. The grass is always greener, huh? Except that they're inside, so there really isn't all that much grass anywhere, but you get my point.

What impressed me the most about Inside Out was that I totally did not see the ending coming. Any of it, really. Snyder did a really good job of coming to an interesting and believable conclusion without doing the obvious. I am definitely looking forward to reading the next book, Outside In. show less

I wasn't sure what to expect from this book. I'm a big fan of Maria's Study and Glass series but because this is a dystopian novel I worried that I might not like it. That was not the case however, as I absolutely loved this book!
The novel is set Inside, which is like a big metal box with all sorts of corridors, rooms and pipework. Trella is a scrub and she works cleaning the pipework. As rumours grow that there is more than just Inside, Trella is roped in to helping discover the truth.
I really liked Trella and her friends and I was rooting for them all the way through the book.

The setting of this book is obviously a major part of the story. I found that the setting was described really well and you can quite easily picture in your mind show more what it's like.

Although the setting is very different to Maria's other books, the writing is still just as great, and there's another awesome female main character. So if you loved Maria's other books, I highly recommend this! show less

This dystopian young adult book is an entertaining quick read with aspects of a survival story, a mystery (complete with twists) and of course a coming-of-age romance.

Seventeen-year-old Trella lives in a giant cube with other “Lowers” like herself. They all work for the “Uppers,” never seen by the Lowers except for the Upper police force. The Lowers do the dirty work of the cube, and are known colloquially as “scrubs.” Trella, because her job is to clean the ducts, has been able to make her way (illegally) all around the pipes of the cube. She also is pretty much of a loner, except for Cog, her best friend from when they were toddlers. Cog believes there is an “Outside” to which they can escape someday. He convinces show more Trella to meet with yet another ”prophet” who periodically appears among the scrubs to assure them that if they are obedient in this life, they can get from the "Inside" to the "Outside" in the next.

Everything changes when the prophet is in danger and Cog wants Trella to help. She is in a unique position to do so because of her duct work, so to speak. And when Trella accidentally falls through a vent and meets an Upper – Riley, a young teen about her age who is also hiding out – all her preconceptions are challenged. Soon they are all fighting to survive, and it seems like their only hope is that there really is an Outside.

Discussion: For some reason, strong female teen protagonists in dystopias also tend to be self-absorbed, bristly, cynical, and defensive. In other words, they seem to be the teen equivalent of the strong female adult who is considered to be a witch for playing on the same field as men. I suppose if you’re trying to negotiate a dystopia, it won’t help you much to be an Anne of Green Gables, but I’d like to see a little more balance.

I loved, however, how the author expressed the way Trella coped with emotions that might weaken her:

"Distractions would be dangerous, and all our efforts would be for nothing if we were caught… I squashed my fear and worries into a small metal box and dropped in the shattered remains of my heart for good measure. Locked with an obnoxiously big lock, I pushed the container into a far corner of my thoughts.”

Trella does grow a bit in the book, especially with the help of the sweet and caring Riley, but she never loses her edge.

Evaluation: I wasn't crazy about this book, but it's nevertheless appealing and has likable characters - even Trella, who clearly has her thorns out only to protect herself from hurt and pain. I did have a couple of quibbles though.

Riley is, in my opinion, a little too soft to be a good match for Trella – I wasn’t buying the chemistry there.

Also, the author came up with an abstruse time system that I felt needlessly complicated the story. Thank heavens Trella also gave her age in “old style” because I was totally not going to do the math! show less

Okay. Let's begin with the fact that I got a digital copy of this early, which -- no, no, no, let's go back farther. Let's begin with the fact that I met MVS back in November (and I never posted pictures or notes of the rollicking good time that was had by all), and at dinner, she told us about the book she was working on that was due to come out in, oh, 1/2 a year (the tease). It was a YA dystopian novel she says, and then I drifted out a bit, because could she have said anything more up my alley? Maria V. Snyder, she of the series' and the characters that make my book club get really loud and inappropriate and, dare I say, fangirlish, was writing a YA. DYSTOPIAN. NOVEL. She somehow read my dreams.

But I didn't want to get my hopes up. show more Too 'up', anyway, because that's not fair, and there were all kinds of what ifs. YA dystopia is not her norm -- what if she can't write YA? What if she can't write dystopia? What if I *gulp* hate it.

What if I drive myself crazy with worry slash ineeditnow, when I know damn well that it's going to have her talent and character-driven goodness behind it. What was I worried about?

All of the things I loved about Snyder's adult books are her in Inside Out. I care about the characters, I see a budding romance, but on a YA level, the writing is super fast paced and catching, and it flows wonderfully. Trella is definitely rootforable, and ya love her even when you want to shake her. There was great tension and edge-of-your-seatness, and the world is fully realized and intriguing, just as her worlds always are. All of this I've come to expect from Snyder. AND there are 2 more good things, which I wasn't expecting. 1 - the beginning had me right from the start. Now, this isn't to say that her beginnings don't generally grab me, because that would be a lie, but they sometimes feel like beginnings to me -- they feel clunkyish or awkward. This was a "plunge right in, sink or swim" beginning, and it worked beautifully. #2 - she shocked me. ME. I'm never surprised by anything that happens in a book. I always see it coming, at least in part, and it's generally a question of how well it's done. But even though I perhaps should have known -- clues were dropped, I'm not an idiot -- she shocked me. I didn't think it could be done. Hats off, Maria.

So I think that's all I can say. I don't want to give anything away, I just want you teased enough that you'll go out and grab this, because trust me, it is well worth it. And then you can sit and wait anxiously with me for the sequel, Outside In.
[laughs diabolically] show less

I really, really wanted to like this book. I tried so hard, but about halfway through, I realized that I hated it, hated the main character, and just wanted the 'oppressors' to take over and be done with it. Heh. Not usually a good sign in a dystopian novel.

What went wrong for me was the way the book was set up: Rather than present a main character in a situation where something major happens that forces a change or action, we're given a character already stuck in an established situation with no apparent reason for zooming in on her life. Nothing remarkable is happening. There's no catalyst for her to change. There's no reason why she should be acting differently from the other people around her, no understandable reason for why she show more should question authority or think that life should change.

And that's what bothered me. When you have an individual living in a dystopian society, there must be a catalyst or specific reason that causes that individual to question the status quo and come to the major realization that things are not as they should be. If someone is living a certain way for their entire life and doesn't know any better (particularly in the way this story is set up), why would they just wake up one morning and decide to rebel? That's not logical.

I found nothing likable about the main character, and I didn't have a reason to root for her because there was nothing that spurred her to action in the first place (that I could tell, anyway). If it happened, it happened before the story opened, and that doesn't exactly make for interesting reading.

And the 'big twist'? Made me groan audibly. Sorry Snyder fans, but I won't be continuing with the sequel. show less

At first I couldn't get into this book, I'm not entirely sure why. I think it might be because in the beginning Trella is not the most endearing character. Trella is a scrub, a lower level worker known as "The Queen of the Pipes". She is standoffish and doesn't have many friends (okay she has one friend) because she prefers solitude which is difficult to get among the thousands of Scrubs she is forced to live with in dorms. But once you see Trella really interact with Cog and she accidentally begins the rebellion, she softens a lot and I really started to like her. I also really loved how everyone came together to help her, so often in a book like this I feel like someone always betrays in a mean spirited way. Yes there was some show more betrayal but most of it was under duress.

There were also a lot of really great surprises in this book that made it an even better read (I'm going to be as general as possible so I don't give anything away). Particularly how Trella met her mother. I always knew that she would eventually meet one of her parents but I wasn't expecting it to come about the way it did. I also really liked getting more specifics about Inside and how it actually worked.

There was so much I going on in this book that we didn't get to know a lot of characters besides Trella, Cog and sort of getting to know Riley. (Although I loved Sheepy and I thought it was a great way of developing Riley and Trella's relationship.) The book was self contained and doesn't need a sequel but since there is one coming out I am hoping we get to know some of the other characters better like Logan and Anne Jade. show less

Trella, a scrub and Queen of the Pipes, has agreed to humor her only friend another time and listen to a new prophet babble on about Gateway in hopes that she can prevent Cogon from getting into trouble. Only this time the prophet doesn't seem to be a Pop Cop ploy or completely delusional man. The prophet asks Trella to break rules restricting the scrubs to the lower levels and steal back important computer files, files that possibly prove Gateway's existence. If Trella gets caught or it turns out to be a trap, she faces death but hope in the lower levels is something worth fighting for.

If you like Maria V. Snyder, read this book. If you like dystopians, read this book. If you like young adult, read this book. Hell, if you even sorta show more kinda find reading a little bit fun, read this book! If I hadn't already been a fan of Snyder's Glass series, there is no way you would have been able to convince me that she hadn't been writing YA dystopians her entire career and this was simply the pièce de résistance. As soon as I finished Inside Out I checked to make sure my local bookstore had the sequel in stock for pickup later that day.

I don't want to say much in this review as I don't want to spoil anything for future readers. I will say that this reading this book has resulted in dystopia being my favorite genre and in having a new book that I plan on irritating all my friends until they read. Often times I love a story for either their characters or the story, I fell in love with both of those in Inside Out. I fell in love with the cleverness of the writing, the emotional response each page drew from me and the sheer pleasure of reading. Inside Out will be something I reread every chance I get.

See my blog for quotes and my thoughts as I read: http://www.bittenbooks.com/2011/05/review-inside-out-insider-1-by-maria-v.html show less