Westerfeld, Scott. Uglies. NY: Simon Pulse, 2005.
narrator: third-person limited, Tally
Finally started this book. I really want to read Peeps, which I also have from the library. I’ve got this whole course mapped out on the vampire trope: Angel, Westerfeld’s Peeps, Jewelle Gomez’s The Gilda Stories, Octavia Butler’s Fledgling, Ann Rice. Start with the black and white Nosferatu. Buffy. What is up with the resurgence of the vampire?
Back to Uglies. I’m having a hard time…it moves well. But some of the uglies/pretties stuff seems forced. At the start, clear condemnation of pretties, their shallowness, forced plastic surgery. Dunno. I think I’ll like this better as it goes on. I like Westerfeld’s piece in his blog about Elmore Leonard’s rules of writing (July 7 2006 posting). And in Westerfeld’s 26 June posting when he’s at the ALA conference in New Orleans, he lets us know that 20th Century Fox with producer John Davis has bought the Uglies series … so we’ll see movies eventually.
15 July and I’m done with Uglies wanting to get on to Pretties. Lots of action, enough build-up of characters. Of course, there’s my most favorite thing in the world: hoverboards. Definitely most detail on hoverboards I’ve read in any sci-fi. Neal Stephenson’s skateboard-rollerblades-hoverboards come close in Snow Crash. I really want to know what middle-school students think of Uglies. Really.
July 15, 2006 at 12:38 pm |
Not to be missed is The Silver Kiss by Annette Curtis Klaus . . . love and vampires and ya . . . a rich history of it, of course . . . also, Klaus’s book Blood and Chocolate is much better, but about the powerful, female-centric world of the werewolf, a space where adolescent girls/women learn the power of their sexuality and of the responsibility of running things in the clan . . .
April 6, 2009 at 4:44 pm |
I loved Uglies. I finished reading Pretties and Specials and am on Extras. Great book so far, great book.