The House of the Scorpion

The House of the Scorpion takes place in the not too distant future in the land of Opium, a country made up of bits of the US and Mexico. Opium is rules by various drug lords but the lord of them all is El Patrón, Matteo Alacrán. El Patrón rules his family and his estates with an iron fist despite being 140 years old. Matt is a lonely boy who knows only life trapped in a small house with Celia in the middle of the poppy fields. That is until some children see Matt and he is so desperate to play that he breaks a window to escape. When he cuts his feet on the glass the children bring him to this magical place. But this is where he finds out that he isn’t a normal child; he is a clone, El Patrón’s clone. Matt life then changes as he must learn how to negotiate is place in Opium and within the vicious Alacrán family. He also learns what it means to be a clone and struggles with whether or not he is a person. Matt also has to decide if he wants to follow in the footsteps of El Patrón or become his own “man”.

This book was gripping, I couldn’t put it down. Matt’s struggle to find out whether he is a human or not what type of treatment he deserves is heart wrenching. Although you could easily guess why El Patrón had a clone you never really knew where Matt stood. Farmer’s ability to keep you in the dark of some obvious facts added to the suspense of the novel. You wanted to help Matt but couldn’t even tell him what to do or who to trust. I would definitely recommend this book for any library collection, and perhaps you should consider a copy for the adults as well.

Age range : 14 plus

Ranking: Quality 5/5 Popularity 4/5

Uglies

Tally is almost 16 and she is waiting for her turn to become Pretty. In this world radical cosmetic surgery is used to make everyone fantastically beautiful. All of Tally’s life had been building towards this moment, the youngest of her friends she is the last one to turn. Her “best friend for life” is now a Pretty living in New Pretty Town and partying all the time. Tally is lonely in her dorm until she meets Shay, an exciting girl from another dorm. Shay teaches Tally to hoverboard and they wait for their turn. Only Shay is different; she never makes morpho’s, mock-ups of what you will look like as a Pretty, she doesn’t like the way that Uglies tease each other, and even talks about liking her asymmetry. Shay tells Tally about people who choose not to turn Pretty, who leave the cities and live in the wild. Tally thinks this is all games until Shay invites her to run away with her.

Tally chooses to stay and turn Pretty but the day of her operation she is taken from the Hospital to Special Circumstances. Here she is told that if she doesn’t follow her friend and reveal the location of Smoke, the settlement in the wild, she will never turn Pretty. Tally has an impossible choice to make either to betray her friend or face a fate worse than death. As Tally learns more about the way her world works the more conflicted she becomes.

Scott Westerfeld has a great writing style that pulls you in to this fairly realistic world. In this dystopia the world is recognizable as definite possibility for our future. I liked Tally and being able to see the world through her eyes as she moves from a sheltered child to a woman. The first book in a trilogy I am definitely committed to reading the other two books. I would recommend this series for any YA collection. The way in which it treats the ideals of beauty is very interesting.

Age range: 15 plus
Ranking: Quality 4/5 Popularity 4/5