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    Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies
    Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies
    Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies
    Ebook155 pages1 hour

    Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies

    By Scott Westerfeld and Craig Phillips

    3.5/5

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    About this ebook

    THE WORLD OF UGLIES, SET IN OUR NOT-SO-DISTANT FUTURE,is a complex place filled with bubbly technology and lingo, yet bogus rules about status and appearance. That's why a guide to the world of uglies has been requisitioned from the hole in the wall. Inside you'll find:

    A rundown on all the cliques, from Crims and Cutters to tech-heads and surge-monkeys

    The complete history, starting with the destruction of the oil bug to the launch of Extras in space

    How all those awesome gadgets came to be: hoverboards, eyescreens, skintennas, sneak suits...

    PLUS an exclusive look at Scott Westerfeld's first draft of Extras -- starring Hiro, not Aya.

    And so much more, it's mind-wrecking.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
    Release dateOct 27, 2009
    ISBN9781442407381
    Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies
    Author

    Scott Westerfeld

    Scott Westerfeld is the author of ten books for young adults, including Peeps, The Last Days, and the Midnighters trilogy. He was born in Texas in 1963, is married to the Hugo-nominated writer Justine Larbalestier, and splits his time between New York and Sydney. His latest book is Extras, the fourth in the bestselling Uglies series.

    Read more from Scott Westerfeld

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    Reviews for Bogus to Bubbly

    3.5/5

    114 ratings10 reviews

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    • 4/5
      When I heard that Scott Westerfield had put together a companion volume to his Uglies series, I was stoked. I love me a good companion volume. I logged onto the library's website and put in a request for it straight away.And I'll tell you, the book is just as fun as it sounds. It's evidently geared at younger Uglies fans, (which does make sense, this being a YA series and all), but there's enough good stuff here that older fans will learn something, too. Westerfield includes a hoverboard manual, maps, (maps!!!!), a history of Tally's world, a guide to life phases in the Prettytime, notes on all the cliques, information on the science that went into the series, notes on the language Tally and her friends use, a glossary, and some other miscellaneous goodness.Personally, I got the most out of the science stuff. I'm sure you science types will find it overly simplistic, but my artistic little self thought Westerfield did a great job of putting everyting into layman's terms. He writes about where the technology in Tally's world comes from. Some things, like nanos, are time-honoured sci fi traditions. Others, like the self-heating food packets, are real, while skintennas and the like are Westerfeld's own invention. Perhaps the most interesting chapter, though, deals with the science of beauty. Westerfeld describes the various theories that went into the Prettytime. It's fascinating stuff.If you enjoyed the Uglies series, I'm sure you'll get a kick out of this book. It's a fast, fun read.(This review originally appeared on my blog, Stella Matutina).
    • 3/5
      So far, I've enjoyed hearing the real-life story that inspired Westerfeld's idea for the novel, but I could have, had I searched it out, found that on the internet. I've never read an "insider's guide" to a book or book series before and had always wondered what the heck they are. So I'm trying it out. I wonder if I'd have liked this more as a teen. I guess I'm supposed to pretend that I AM a character in Westerfield's utopia, and if I were, here is the handbook for operating the hoverboards. Here's a map of Prettyland. Here is a more in-depth summary of the rules, and the history, etc.

      Update: I actually liked this! There's a section that gets way too scientific for me about the science behind the sci-fi (it gave me a headache) but there's also a lot of literary analysis & introspection on Westerfeld's part that would satisfy any lit major, except that it may give away a bit too much. But since his audience isn't college English majors, it should be okay.

      In this guide, you can learn more about Westerfeld's fictional society as if it were real, find out the "why" behind many of the choices he made (character's names, plot elements, last lines of the books, etc.), find out which sci-fi elements are actually possible or in existance today, what he hoped readers would take away from the book, and even learn how to create your own slang via the rules he followed in making his. His super-fan club would enjoy seeing drafts of Extras, and I enjoyed not having to read Extras because he summarizes the plot & presents an in-depth analysis of its themes, so I don't have to read it. Yay! All was resolved for me at the end of Specials, anyway.

      Who would I recommend this to? It would only be to students who not only read the entire series, but kids who DEVOURED it and never struggled with comprehension, because the reading is actually more complex in this guide than the novels themselves. I don't think he pared down his vocabulary at all, and wrote like he was talking to peers, not kids.
    • 3/5
      Just some koool background information. No help in using the text for discussion. Ah well.
    • 4/5
      This isn’t exactly a review. Scott Westerfeld has written a series called “The Uglies Series” it seemed to have started as a trilogy, but ended up with 4 books (please don’t make me spell that). This book is like a cheat sheet, a reference book to the series. A book to have handy while you’re reading the series, since a dictionary won’t help.Scott Westerfeld tells us where he got the idea for the book (HAH! You’ll understand if you read it.) and where he came up with some of the terms and the ‘language’ he uses in the book. Be warned, if you read it before you read any of the books, there may be some things in there that could be considered spoilers. However if you are reading the books and getting totally confused, this book will clear up a lot of the confusion.I checked this series out of the library. I have been reading books that took forever to get through and wanted something I could just burn through without being mind numbing. I read the first two yesterday. I think they’ll do the trick.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
       A companion volume to the Uglies series, this is a fun insight into the creation of the world and the people in it.
    • 3/5
      This book helps to understand all the other ugly books. There are puictures that help ease the reading too!
    • 4/5
      One of my all time favorite series is Scott Westerfeld's "Uglies". I was so thrilled that I bought a set for our morning school book club. I am now down to four books because students have loved them so much they have kept them. In Bogus to Bubbly, Westerfeld answers all of those questions we had as we read the series. How did he come up with the names and the slang words he used in his books? How did he create the science based items in his book and what are the chances that we will see them in the future. All of these questions and more are answered in this book. It is a definite for anyone who loves the "Uglies" series.
    • 4/5
      This was a cool insite into the author's mind. I liked reading about how he got some of the ideas, also he pointed out things I didn't quite catch while reading the series, so I'm glad I read this book. But once is enough.
    • 3/5
      To be perfectly honest, I wish I hadn't gotten this book. It might be more worth-reading if I was more interested in technology (which was basically what the whole thing was about), but in actuality I thought it was extremely long-winded for such a little book. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone not extremely into sci-fi. Also, I got the impression more than once that Scott Westerfeld was a woman. I don't know why, but it definitely seemed that way.P.S. : Don't let this sway anyone from the Uglies series. Those books were really good.
    • 4/5
      I'm classifying this as non-fiction even though it's about half non-fiction and half fictional non-fiction. In Bogus to Bubbly, Westerfeld talks about how he came up with the idea for his Uglies series and for various things in the books, including the slang, the names, and the technologies. He also includes "instruction manuals" for some technologies, like the hoverboards, and "history" passages, such as how future generations would view what happened in the books. It was an interesting, if quick, read.

    Book preview

    Bogus to Bubbly - Scott Westerfeld

    Nature . . . didn’t need an operation to be beautiful. It just was.

    —UGLIES

    THE BIG IDEA

    Where did you get the idea for that nose?

    —FRIZZ

    One of the most common questions writers are asked is, Where do you get your ideas? But the sad truth is, we don’t know. Ideas can come at any time and from any direction: in the shower, waiting for an elevator, or while bouncing across Wikipedia pages.

    Even if we don’t know for sure how books come into our heads, we still like making up answers for this dreaded question, and eventually these stories stick. So if you’ve ever seen me speaking in public, you’ve probably already heard this tale, pretty much word for word.

    But just because I always tell it the same way, doesn’t make it true. . . .

    HOW I GOT THE IDEA FOR UGLIES

    Many years ago one of my New York friends got a job in Los Angeles. We were all nervous for him. He was nervous for him, because Los Angelinos can be weird. For one thing, they have this crazy theory that LA is the center of the universe. This, of course, is offensive to us New Yorkers, given that New York City really is the center of the universe.

    I mean, all they’ve got is beaches and movie stars, right? Whereas we have muggers, the subway, and tortured intellectuals. There’s really no competition.

    After my friend moved to LA, he would write us long, funny e-mails about his culture shock. My favorite described a visit to a Los Angeles dentist. At first it all seemed pretty normal: He sat in a chair, he rinsed and spat, the dentist poked and prodded. But after her inspection of his teeth was over, the dentist sighed and said, I’m sorry, but it looks like I need to see you in my office.

    Er, okay, said my friend, wondering if he had teeth cancer or something.

    He followed her back to a wood-paneled office, plaques covering the walls, and they both sat down. She made a tent with her fingers, leaned across the desk, and looked at him carefully, as if considering how to break bad news to him. Finally she said, I need to ask you a serious question. Where do you want your teeth to be in five years?

    My friend stared at her. It wasn’t exactly what he’d been expecting.

    Um, in my mouth? he ventured.

    Yes, very amusing, she said. But seriously, I think we need to talk about a five-year plan for your teeth.

    My friend continued to stare, completely flummoxed. He didn’t know anyone with a five-year plan for their teeth. Was this some sort of LA practical joke?

    This confusion lasted for a few minutes, until finally the dentist explained using a simple diagram. Basically, at one end of the scale were my friend’s teeth: normal, slightly coffee-stained New Yorker teeth. And at the other end, in the vanishing distance, were . . . Tom Cruise’s teeth.

    You know: Tom Cruise has these superwhite, supereven glowing teeth that shine like a spotlight when he smiles. So the dentist was asking: Over the next five years, how much pain did he want to endure and how much money did my friend want to spend on his journey toward Tom Cruise–like teeth?

    My friend answered, Um, I’ll get back to you on that.

    He left the dentist’s office and walked around—this was one of the few parts of LA with sidewalks and actual pedestrians—and as he stared at people, my friend kept wondering: Who else has a five-year plan?

    Then he noticed a woman who might have had a five-year plan; she was about 25 percent of the way to Tom Cruise. And a man whose teeth were even whiter and straighter—like, 50 percent. And finally he saw a woman whose teeth shone like floodlights—even in the middle of the day—she had gone out the other side of Tom Cruise!

    Did she have a ten-year plan?

    All of us back in New York thought this e-mail was hilarious. Those crazy Los Angelinos and their teeth! But the story also got me thinking: What would the world be like if everyone had a five-year plan? Not just for their teeth but for their hair and skin and eyes? What if going to the doctor wasn’t about your health at all, but about how you wanted to look?

    What if cosmetic surgery was so common that you had to get it, or you’d be an outcast?

    With this notion in my head, I started researching plastic surgery, the science of beauty, and a million other things I needed to know to create a believable future: magnetic levitation, nanotechnology, and, of course, brainwashing (because that’s an important part of what’s going on here). Slowly, Tally’s world started to fall into place, and all the betrayals, victories, and defeats that she and her friends live through.

    But it’s still a bit odd to think that it all began with a trip to the dentist.

    What follows are my notes on the process: the decisions about the characters, the settings, and the science and technology behind the world of Uglies. I’ve also included a few documents that you’d be able to read if you could somehow visit that world: a history book, a hoverboard manual, and a few maps.

    I hope you enjoy them.

    HOVERBOARD MANUAL

    Never bored on a hoverboard.

    —SHAY

    The most common wish I hear from Uglies fans is that someone would get busy inventing a hoverboard. This desire even beats a non-bubblehead version of the operation. Ask yourself this: Would you trade a pretty face for the ability to fly? I certainly would.

    Almost all my books have some kind of flying, climbing, or falling in them. That’s partly because I’ve always had flying dreams, and I have this thing about heights. In college I used to climb buildings for fun, as a way of exploring the campus and hacking the physical world. (But please don’t try this at home—or at school.)

    Being up in the air is a dramatic way for characters to see their world from a new perspective—literally, I suppose. As Zane says in Pretties, Nothing like heights to keep you bubbly. Even in our world, where flying is commonplace and amazingly boring, it still is a part of our dreams, and falling is a mainstay of our nightmares.

    Of course, in Tally’s world hoverboards weren’t just for fun. This was the machine that freed tricky uglies from the boundaries of their cities, after all, allowing them to travel through the wild to the Rusty Ruins and the Smoke. It was only after exploring the world that Tally and Shay realized how many things needed changing. A few magnetic lifters meant the difference between joining the revolution and being stuck in their dorm rooms.

    So what would it be like to requisition your own hoverboard? Luckily, the historians of the Awesome Librarians clique discovered this vintage user’s manual in the memory stick of an old public wallscreen. As you read it, just imagine you’re standing on your first hoverboard, ready to test your tricks against dorm monitors, safety trackers, and the edges of the grid.

    CONGRATULATIONS on your requisition of a Series 9 Hoverboard!

    You have countless hours of flying ahead of you, but it’s important to read these safety and control tips before jumping on board. That’s why your hoverboard has been shipped with uncharged lifters. Place it near a public energy point, and it will be ready to go in only two hours!

    Please read the following carefully. The life you save may be your own.

    THE HISTORY OF HOVERING

    Flying is so easy these days that we sometimes forget what a complex machine a hoverboard is. Simplicity of use is the result of high technology and two centuries of careful testing and design. Ever since the Rusty Crash made it clear that internal combustion was a planet-wrecking idea, scientists realized that an efficient, electricity-based form of travel was something the world couldn’t survive without.

    These days, magnetic levitation has become the primary means of transportation. This leaves our cities much more space for trees, soccer fields, and pleasure gardens, because we don’t have to cover everything with paved roads like the Rusties did. Our roads are invisible because they’re buried under the ground!

    THE GRID

    Using the remains of the Rusty Ruins around us, your city government has built a grid, a lattice of ferrous metal buried a few meters below the ground. (Ferrous metals have iron in them, which

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