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    Uglies
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    Uglies
    Ebook388 pages5 hours

    Uglies

    By Scott Westerfeld

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    The first book in Scott Westerfeld's international bestselling series, Uglies!

    Tally lives in a world where your sixteenth birthday brings aesthetic perfection: an operation which erases all your flaws, transforming you from an 'Ugly' into a 'Pretty'. She is on the eve of this important event, and cannot wait for her life to change. As well as guaranteeing supermodel looks, life as a Pretty seems to revolve around having a good time. But then she meets Shay, who is also fifteen - but with a very different outlook on life. Shay isn't sure she wants to be Pretty and plans to escape to a community in the forest - the Rusty Ruins - where Uglies go to escape ' turning'. Tally won't be persuaded to join her, as this would involve sacrificing everything she's ever wanted for a lot of uncertainty.

    When she is taken in for questioning on her birthday, however, Tally gets sent to the Ruins anyway - against her will. The authorities offer Tally the worst choice she could ever imagine: find her friend Shay and turn her in, or never turn Pretty at all. What she discovers in the Ruins reveals that there is nothing 'pretty' about the transformations... And the choice Tally makes will change her world forever.

    ‘Fast paced, exciting and thought-provoking.’ The Bookseller's Choice
    ‘Superb sci-fi.’ Amanda Craig, The Times Supplement
    ‘Westerfeld introduces thought-provoking issues’ Publishers Weekly
    ‘The longing for fairy-tale beauty has never looked so sinister’ Amanda Craig, The Times
    ‘With a beginning and ending that pack hefty punches, this introduction to a dystopic future promises an exciting series.’ Kirkus *starred review*
    ‘Naughty children, from Max in Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are, to Tally in Scott Westerfeld's Uglies trilogy, have the imagination and energy to go beyond convention.’ The Times
    ‘This exciting story makes you realise how important it is not to judge people by appearances.’ Newcastle Upon Tyne Journal
    ‘This book is a real thrill-ride and the world utterly convincing.’ Trashionista.com
    'Fun, and the many by-the-skin-of-your-teeth escapes and hoverboard chases, plus the non-stop action plotting were enough to catch my attention and have me eagerly wanting more.’ The Book Smugglers

    Also by Scott Westerfeld:
    Pretties
    Specials
    Extras
    Afterworlds
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster UK
    Release dateMar 4, 2010
    ISBN9781847389091
    Author

    Scott Westerfeld

    Scott Westerfeld is the author of the Leviathan series, the first book of which was the winner of the 2010 Locus Award for Best Young Adult Fiction. His other novels include the New York Times bestseller Afterworlds, the worldwide bestselling Uglies series, The Last Days, Peeps, So Yesterday, and the Midnighters trilogy. Visit him at ScottWesterfeld.com or follow him on Twitter at @ScottWesterfeld.

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    Reviews for Uglies

    4/5

    4,523 ratings365 reviews

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    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this a lot. It was easy to see how their world could come about, and so, so easy to understand the desire to want to become Pretty. Life is easy when you're a New-Pretty, everyone loves you and life is one big party. There's no pressure, no competition, none of the pain we live with.

      I felt for Tally, I really did. All she wanted was to feel good and safe and that was threatened. She had to betray her friend in order to have the life she wanted. No, not the life she wanted, but the life she and everyone else gained as a matter of course.

      One of my favorite scenes was Tally looking at the "ancient" magazines and remarking upon the photo of a model. Our society does horrible things to our girls, including anorexia, and having Tally think about that from her place in her society really struck me.

      This book had been recommended by readers I trust and I can see why they liked it so much.
    • 4/5
      Tally can't wait until her sixteenth birthday--that's when she turns pretty and will be able to join all her pretty friends across the river. But until then, she and the rest of the uglies must remain in their place, leading sheltered lives and never venturing far from the school and dormitories. At least, their not supposed to. A few tend to bend and even break the rules; Tally herself has snuck across the river many a time. Her best friend Peris is lucky; he's already turned sixteen and had the operations needed to make him pretty. Poor Tally is left mostly alone, until she meets and befriends a fellow mischievous ugly, Shay. But Shay isn't so happy about turning pretty. In fact, she would rather stay just as she is. Shay runs away to a hidden, outsider community to ensure that this will never change. Tally once again is left alone. But everything will be better once she is pretty. Except the authorities refuse to turn her pretty until she helps find her friend, and bring her back. The decisions she faces, and the decisions she makes, will change her life forever. The first book in a trilogy, Uglies is wonderful dystopian fiction for young adults. I did want to throttle a character now and then, but for the most part this book was quite enjoyable and I look forward to reading the next two books, Pretties and Specials. Experiments in Reading
    • 5/5
      The premise: in Tally's world, turning sixteen isn't about getting the license to drive, it's about turning pretty. This is a world where everyone goes through a major operation at the age of sixteen to become impossibly beautiful, and she can't wait. Until her best friend decides she doesn't want to turn pretty at all, that people shouldn't be ashamed of their faces, and runs away. This shouldn't affect Tally, but some higher-ups have decided to use Tally to track down rebels like her best friend and break up the resistance to the pretty society. Suddenly Tally is learning some very ugly truths about her pretty society, and if she doesn't do what she's asked, she'll never be pretty. But if she does, it means betraying her best friend.My RatingMust Have: it's a fast, enticing read that does an amazing job at illustrating the heart of teen issues and fears. And the fact it does it in such a well-drawn SF dystopia makes it something more than a must-YA-read, but a must-SF read as well. I've yet to see an adult SF writer (meaning, writers for adults) take a science fictional spin on the ideas of beauty and letting those ideas drive the story rather than be window-dressing. At least, I haven't seen this in a novel. Short stories, I wouldn't be surprised. Anyway, I look forward to reading the rest of these books, and as of right now, I'm more than willing to check out other Westerfeld titles as well.The full review, which does contain spoilers, may be found at my LJ. As always, comments and discussion are most welcome. REVIEW: Scott Westerfeld's UGLIESHappy Reading! :)
    • 4/5
      The world of Uglies is our own, but after we damaged our planet and ourselves almost to the point of no return, society gets restarted in a place where everything is self-sufficient and no one is discriminated based on their physical appearance because, ta-dahh, everyone is pretty. Well, not everyone, everyone over the age of 16, because before that they are not old enough to go under the knife. So, these young teenagers who have yet to discover the wonders of cosmetic surgery are called Uglies. Because it's what they are – Ugly.Tally is one of those, months away from getting her operation, and she can't hardly wait to join the rest of her friends in the parties and being simply amazing. She is the last of her mates to turn 16, so she feels really alone in Uglyville, so much that she decides to go sneak up to New Pretty Town, to check on her BFF, Peris, who has been there for so long and hasn't bothered to write. Or call.Things do not go exactly as planned, Tally is trespassing after all, but she satisfies her need to see her friend, who makes her promise not to get into more trouble before she gets the operation, and she meets someone else doing the same as her, Shay, who becomes her new best friend. They do stuff together all the time, enjoying their time left in Uglyville to play all the pranks they want, Shay even teaches Tally to hoverboard (yes, hooerboard, think Marty McFly and Back to the Future). But when the big day looms close (and it's the big day for both of them, they share a birthday), Shay tells Tally she doesn't want to pretty (*gasp* The Horror!), instead she is going to runaway and join a group of rebels who also don't want to be pretty, known as Smokies (they live in The Smoke). Shay would have liked to have Tally runaway with her, but Tally is not having that. She wants to be pretty. But since she is in such good terms with Shay, she promises to think about it, and Shay leaves her a coded message on how to get to The Smoke.Tally would never use that, of course, if The Powers That Be hadn't noticed Shay's leaving and Shay's new best friend. As it was, they made her an Ultimatum, she either had to help them catch the Smokies (breaking a promise to Shay of not telling her secret) or she would be ugly forever. Poor Tally thinks, and thinks, and decides to help TPTB somewhat – she'll go to Smoke, see what it's all about, and then she'll decide whether to betray her friend's trust or not.And so, with hoverboard in hand, a pack full of concentrated Spaghetti Bolognese, Tally hovers away to get to The Smoke, not without perils, since this girl almost got roasted alive (this section remind me of The Hunger Games). And let me stop here before I summarize the entire book. (There aren't many spoilers, though, most of this is on the back cover, only much more concentrated summarized)Anyway... It took sometime to have the courage to pick this book up. Why? Well, to me beauty is, of course, in the eye of the beholder, and my eyes are sometimes different from other eyes. So, this world where everyone was pretty, it wasn't gathering points with me. But I started the book, and I understood the concept of beauty used here – mainstream beauty, evening out differences, going for the big eyes, pouting mouth look of innocence, that ensured that there was a biological/psychological need to protect and love that person. I would be utterly miserable in that world, of course, but I can understand the reasons why it worked. As I continued reading I could also see how this world could be seen as school metaphor – the younger Uglies earning to enter that cool place that is New Pretty Town (*ahem, cof, High School, cof*). Tally, with her eagerness to also be pretty, never really impressed me. She was fun, but had the book been about someone else, it would have been the same for me – I was reading for the world and the society, not the characters. In fact, I will continue reading the series for those reasons, even if there was some growth, at least where Tally is concerned. There was also a bit of romance in there, which, unsurprisingly, didn't impress me either. This book's strengths are both the worldbuilding, and the action. There is plenty of action going on, from Tally and Shay's pranks, to the lone trip of Tally through the wasteland that our world has become, to the events on Smoke, rescue missions, hiding and going undercover. Lots of stuff that kept the pages flying by.It did end on a cliffhanger (one has to ensure that readers will pick up the next book, right?), and as such I want to know what happens next. I also want to learn more about the world.Also at Spoilers and Nuts
    • 3/5
      In this seriously bizarre world that Westerfeld has envisioned, wars, civil unrest, jealousy and alienation are all things of the past - because when a person turns 16 they undergo plastic surgery and are given the qualities of a desirable mate - huge eyes, full lips, even skin-tone, the list goes on. Bones are changed so everyone is the same height, fat is sucked out, plastic cheekbones are inserted under the skin. This is a world that promotes equality and achieves it by eliminating the differences between individuals. And it creeped me out from the blurb onwards. It's frightening because on a basic level it makes sense, but it violates everything I know and believe about being proud of individuality.My favourite aspect of the book have to be the mysterious Special Circumstances people - they sound like a truly scary bunch! With all their special augmentation they behave more like robots than human beings, and I think they creeped me out more than anything else about this world. Dr. Cable is a great villain as the classic evil doctor. I can totally imagine her with her lab coat and maniacal laughing as she operates on Uglies. Another aspect of the world I enjoyed was the society in The Smoke. They are so normal to me and yet at the same time so alien to Tally, and I enjoyed reading how they survive outside of the influence of the cities. One of my favourite scenes is when Tally realises that children used to resemble their parents before the operations. I think it was really well done and showcased exactly how much humanity had lost.Tally is a hard character for me to like - she's in many ways the anti-thesis to other female YA heroines. She hungers for the operation and counts down the days until her birthday. She firmly believes in her society and doesn't understand why Shay, her new friend, wouldn't want the operation.When Tally is blackmailed into journeying to The Smoke, a hidden community of people like Shay who ran away before they could have the operation, she is happy to do it, thinking she will be rescuing Shay from a horrible fate. It is only when Tally reaches The Smoke and learns the awful secret behind the operations that she changes her mind about it all. However, her strong belief in the system is shattered in only a few days - she goes from being disgusted at the uglies to being friends with them, sharing their meals and even kissing one of them. It's all too quick and doesn't make sense given how conditioned she was to her society before.A clever and enjoyable story, Uglies has certainly made an impression on me and now I completely understand what the hype is about. I have the rest of the series sitting on my shelves, so I will be reading it as soon as I can. If you love a good dystopian novel and haven't tried this book yet, then I strongly recommend it to you!You can read more of my reviews at Speculating on SpecFic.
    • 4/5
      In Uglyville, at the age of 16, you gleefully and thankfully receive an operation to become pretty, then you can live in Pretty Town. With her operation only weeks away, Tally befriends Shay (whose operation is also around the corner), and she sheds a new light on the much awaited change.I love suspense. Especially when I don't want to put the book down. This one was like that for me. It is another science fiction novel that has realistic elements that holds it together, which helps me accept it. As for the plot - it never stopped and even surprised me a time or two. And, interestingly enough, I even joined in on a few rides - too fun!I teetered between a 4 and 4.25/5 because while I thought it was very good, I thought the YA showed through with its simplistic language. Unfortunately (for me), I don't like to feel like I'm reading a YA book when in fact it is. Despite that, keeping up the suspense and intrigue warranted the higher rating. (4.25/5)Originally posted on: Thoughts of Joy
    • 3/5
      I’ve wanted to read the Uglies quartet for years, ever since they showed up on my little sister’s shelves. The series takes place in a post-apocalyptic society where all of humanity is gathered into a few independent cities. In every city, when citizens reach their 16th birthday they undergo a surgery to change them from “uglies” into super-model gorgeous “pretties”. There is, of course, a catch. Both the catch and most of the other plot points were quite predictable, although the motivations of those in charge surprised me; I just don’t feel like they got enough out of it. But the idea was novel and I appreciated that. The world was also very well developed and the details of the procedure by which people became pretty were fleshed out enough to make it very believable.

      Read more here...
    • 3/5
      Some of the most entertaining SF takes an aspect of current life and exaggerates it with interesting results. Tally lives in a future world where all adolescents are "ugly" and live in dorms, going to school and awaiting the ultimate sweet sixteen - surgical transformation into a "pretty" who have years of parties awaiting them. Uglies blow off steam by sneaking out at night and pulling off stunts, but Tally seems to have a knack of getting into more trouble than most. She has adventures with bungee suits, hoverboards, city ruins, and a new best friend. Little by little, she will learn what is behind the strict stratification of her society and what other options are open to her - or not. It's the first of a trilogy and I'm ready to listen to the next one. This one loses a star for the reader's vocal characterizations of some of the characters. Shea's voice was irritatingly flat and toneless, but overall, it was a fun adventure.
    • 4/5
      I loved the premise of this book, what a clever idea.
    • 4/5
      An excellent dystopian tale of choice, trust, and weeds.

      The Writing and Worldbuilding

      While the writing style wasn't my absolute favorite, it was engaging and managed to make the slower parts of the book not so boring as they had the potential to be. The dialogue felt a bit 2005, but the book was published then, so I can't really hold that against it. I was particularly fond of the motifs and themes of the book, my favorite being the beautiful flowers that are invasive weeds literally choking out all other life, and ultimately even themselves.

      The flowers were so beautiful, so delicate and unthreatening, but they choked everything around them.
      The premise sounded somewhat far-fetched at first, but it is executed so well that by the end, I could really see this as a possible future, which was frightening. The technology was well explained and plausible (at least to me, but I'm no scientist).

      What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.
      The Characters

      Tally: She was really consistent, yet still grew a lot, which I really liked. She stayed true to her fundamental person—a person of action, but also thought—and also learned to let go of some of her faults—indecision, selfishness, and even self-consciousness. And me of all people actually liking a female protagonist is really something.

      Shay: I loved Shay. She is fun and spunky, and somewhat of a tomboy, but still maintaining some girlish charm.

      Doing what you're supposed to do is always boring. I can't imagine anything worse than being required to have fun.
      David: Despite being a tad insta-love-y, David was also really great! His insta-love had actual believable reasons, and he was just such a sweet guy!

      Dr. Cable: Specials in general are pretty freaky, but this one in particular was super creepy.

      Conclusion

      It definitely wasn't my favorite book ever, but I did really like it, and actually really brought back some appreciation for YA that had been dying in me, so I'm really glad I read it, and I would definitely recommend it. And besides all that, my older sister has been trying to get me to read this series since like 2010, so it was surely time.
    • 4/5
      I've not read much young adult fiction, so I wasn't sure what to expect going in. I liked Uglies a good deal. Westerfeld does a nice job of using pretty standard plot structures and characters to make something that feels fresh. His prose gets a little melodramatic at points, but I'm guessing that's to ratchet up tension? There's some interesting thematic things going on too. Overall, well-written and interesting. I'm excited to read the next one.
    • 4/5
      I've had this book and the others in the series sitting on my shelves for months now. I read one great review, went out and purchased them; then I started seeing a lot of mixed reviews.
      Granted, the story starts out slow, can be totally confusing with some of the words used; but overall I believe this is a great story. As a mother of a soon to be teen (9), I am constantly trying to get her to understand that she doesn't have to look like everyone else to be pretty; the Uglies touches on just about the same thing.
      With Tally only counting the days till she can be a Pretty along with her friend Peris, and Shay wanting nothing more than to stay an Uglie, the lines are drawn. When Shay took off, I just knew that something was going to happen to Tally to make it to where she wouldn't get to be Pretty.
      I can't say too much more without giving the story away, but the trip to the Smoke was a wild one and I can't wait to read the next book to find out if David still cares.
    • 4/5
      The world of the Uglies universe seems rather sickeningly vain and shallow, but it also seems clear that this is extremely intentional. In a world where everything revolves around how you look, why would you not obsess about looking pretty? In fact, it would become everything to you. There's definitely quite an obvious lesson there for the real world too. Yet, as the story evolves, you start to find out that there is indeed something far more serious and sinister beneath the service. It's definitely enough to make me want to read the sequel and see where the story here leads, since it definitely ends on a promising note.
    • 5/5
      great book to start off a dystopian interest. i just couldn't stop reading. the rest of the series is just as great as well.
    • 5/5
      I love this book!
    • 1/5
      it was ok but definitely not as good as i expected the main character was really annoying at times
    • 5/5
      Uglies is a great read for young adults interested in science fiction and dystopian worlds. Tally Youngbood, the protagonist, is gutsy, appealing and intelligent. One dilemma Tally faces is whether to become a "Pretty", party endlessly and reunite with her former best friend, Peris. This dilemma is juxtaposed with Tally's desire to jrun away with her new friend to join a rogue community outside her city. Westerfeld brings a fresh perspective and insights into the questions of inner beauty vs. external beauty, what it means to belong to a community, and the role government can play in controlling its citizens.This book could be a great addition to a science fiction lit class. It could also fit into a study of government and government control. It could be used in a wellness/health class as a catalyst for societal expectations of beauty, and how society defines and exploits beauty. Finally, I would recommend this book to library patrons interested in YA science fiction with a compelling main character.
    • 5/5
      Scott Westerfield's "Uglies" is young adult science fiction novel set in a future time in which everyone undergoes a compulsory surgery that turns them into when they turn sixteen. Tally Youngblood yearns to be a "pretty," and she is very nearly there. While biding her time, she becomes close to another "ugly," a girl named Shay. But when Shay runs away to find The Smoke, a community of people who refused to undergo the operation, the authorities send Tally to find her. I she fails in her mission, she will have remain an ugly forever. Although she still wants to be pretty, what Tally finds at The Smoke changes everything.In "Uglies" Westerfield plays upon the insecurities of his readers: what teen wouldn't want to be amazingly attractive and spend all their time partying? But, of course, being pretty is not everything it's cracked up to be. This tension, which exists in our own world, is what makes the story so compelling, and teens will be able to identify. "Uglies" is an intriguing commentary on our own society and where it might be headed. Tally, as a character, is not always very likable, but, nevertheless, readers will feel for her, since they understand the draw of what she stands to lose.The technology in "Uglies" is another aspect of the book that will appeal to teen readers, grades 7 and up. Cool gadgets like hover boards and interface rings add whole new element to the action of the plot. The rules in Tally's world are completely different than ours, so there's no telling how things will go.
    • 2/5
      Considering this was on my wish list, I was very much looking forward to reading it. I must say, I was greatly disappointed. It started off well, introducing us to Tally and her utalitarian world. The story held my attention for about the first 100 pages before I started to become frustrated with the plot development and the fact that I wasn't connecting to any of the characters.There is one goal: to be a Pretty.Tally longs to join the folks in New Pretty Town and become what society deems as 'perfect'. After the first 100 pages, I started to get bored as the story was just dragging along. There was always constant movement, yet the story was not progressing. Many scenes lacked significance. At times, I felt as if I was in a parked car, and everything around me was moving. Although we get to see Shay and Tally go on adventures, it felt as if the story wasn't going anywhere. I felt as if I could do without those scenes as they didn't add much to the story. I wanted Westerfeld to just get to the point and stop lollygagging.The story just didn't fly off the pages for me. I didn't feel the presence of the character, I didn't particularly care for the romance that was forming between Tally and David nor did I care much for how the story would end. I skimmed a few pages, particularly towards the end, which I don't like to do, as I feel I'll miss out on important information. It's a good concept. It just wasn't executed well. At least, that's how I feel.Westerfeld writes well, but the story just didn't grab me. Uglies was an okay read, but I don't think I'll be continuing on with the rest of the books in the series.
    • 5/5
      I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, beginning to end. It was just so unique and relatable on a certain level.
    • 3/5
      Is the only thing that keeps us warring and petty fighting that we are different physically? If were all able, in fact forced, to achieve the same standard of beauty, would we be perpetually happy and content? If you lived in New Pretty Town, your answer would be yes. If you were growing up, waiting for your operation so that you didn't have to look at your imperfections, you would probably also say yes. But what if the concept of individually and embracing, or at least not obsessing, physical flaws was deemed radical and dangerous? The book follows these questions and attempts to answer them. While this is a beautiful idea for a book, it's only skin deep. These premise has the ability to create a profound, emotionally rich story and yet it falls short. As an early-young adult book, it may read differently. As an adult read, I won't find myself picking up the next book.
    • 4/5
      This is an engrossing novel that delves into the concept of beauty. There is nothing too violent or sexual so it should be appropriate for teens. It is not a difficult read but the concepts are very thought provoking. The three main novels (Uglies, pretties, and specials) are meant to be read together as the first two do not resolve everything and they all build off each other.
    • 4/5
      Uglies was an enjoyable read. I liked the way that the author challenges our concepts of what is "ugly" and what is "pretty." It was fun and entertaining and I can't wait to read the next book in the series. I sure hope it's in at the library tonight when I get there!
    • 4/5
      I consider myself ugly.. compared to Bella Swan!!! I used to love Twilight and even rated the book a 4*, but after Kristen Stewart played her my hope dashed to pieces. This YA novel hopefully would change all that. No more Kristen Stewart wannabe to play the heroine, not even Jennifer Lawrence! If they want to turn this story into movie, they'd have to find someone like America Ferrera to play Tally Youngblood.Tally lives in a dystopian world where everyone after turning 16 will be allowed to undergo cosmetic surgery and turn themselves into pretties, complete with all the geometrics that comes with it. She has a friend who she loved when they were still both uglies, who took her to snoop on the pretties who live in the New Pretty Town. When he becomes pretty, she is left alone and met Shay, who's not yet turned into pretties and refuses to become one.The government found out that Shay left shortly before the intended operation and forces Tally to look for Shay, or else they would not let Tally to have the operation. Thus Tally's adventure starts and she learns that the world, while it used to be ugly, is a much better one that what the government wants them to believe.The characters in the book bring up the debate to the readers of what considered to be pretty - do you want to be one, or are you proud of being born flawed?One of the weakness of the book is the plot, and the author's depiction of the gadgets used - I had a hard time imagining the surfboard Tally and Shay used to navigate - but in general the main idea is what matters. I would like to see the book being more detailed, instead of skimming through the surface of reader's imagination. Well, do you consider yourself pretty enough? How come nobody bothers to write about smarties, for once? *sigh*
    • 3/5
      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 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.
    • 4/5
      Full, non-spoiler review courtesy at Book & Movie Dimension a BlogScott Westerfeld is a unique Young Adult Fiction writer. I came across him while reading the Uglies Series. Originally a trilogy but because of its great success later a quartet really. This series deals with lost of Science Fiction elements. It has a more realistic touch in the fiction genre. He has a got this sense of common language and the tone of his stories is similiar to watching Star Wars, The Matrix, Terminator, and Science Fiction films in book form with his own style of writing. His stories because he also has other books besides this series. They are fantastic as well. He weaves good stories that are really comepelling and when they end very grounded.
    • 2/5
      The day I finished reading Scott Westerfeld's Uglies, a coworker picked it up off my desk. "Uglies?" She asked, with a slight sneer. That sneer only deepened when she read the novel's tagline (in an appropriately arch tone): "In a world of extreme beauty, anyone normal is Ugly."I wish I could have responded that the book was a criticism of societies where "extreme beauty" is prized, but after finishing Westerfeld’s novel, I'm not entirely sure that’s the case. On the surface it certainly seems true. Uglies is the story of Tally Youngblood, who, at nearly sixteen, is about to undergo surgery to make her beautiful. In her world (a post-apocalyptic future, where now-contemporary humans are referred to as "Rusties" and frequently cited for our Rusty and destructive ways), this is what all children do upon coming of age. As in Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron," their society rejects physical differences in favor of a flat standard of beauty. Unlike in "Harrsion Bergeron," they achieve this goal by raising the bar across the board, making everyone beautiful rather than average.And it works. Tally's is a world without war or hunger or disease—particularly self-inflicted diseases like anorexia. As far as post-apocalyptic utopias go, this one is particularly utopic: everything is recycled, no one eats meat, and vehicles are powered by magnets rather than fossil fuels.This creates a two-fold problem, my biggest issue with the book. First, I never believed for a second that Tally’s world was one that could actually ever come to fruition. This is a cotton-candy utopia, bolstered neither by scene descriptions or by Westerfeld's very weak science-fiction conceits. The "science fiction" here (hoverboards, hovercars) was clichéd well before it was featured in Back to the Future II. These days, it just plain doesn't pass muster. This was made worse, not better, by Westerfeld's use of extremely grating invented slang. I couldn't help but be reminded by this review of Margaret Atwood’s Year of the Flood. World-building is a delicate process, and if you're going to try to use language to compliment that, it should be done with both restraint and grace (or done wholeheartedly and immersively, as in A Clockwork Orange or Riddley Walker). All this talk of bubbliness and SpagBol and PadThai and Uglies and Littlies felt neither restrained nor graceful, which made the world that much more difficult to believe.Secondly, I had trouble seeing the dangers supposedly inherent in Tally's world. At the beginning of the novel, Tally meets Shay, another young Ugly, who leads her out of her society and into the world of the Smoke, a group of resistance fighters who have opted-out of the City lifestyle. We learn (through a chapter of awkward info-dumping) that the surgery that makes Uglies into Pretties also makes Pretties stupid and pliant. And yet I couldn't help but wonder if that was a necessary addition to the surgery because Westerfeld hadn’t quite convinced himself (and he definitely hadn't quite convinced this reader) that everyone becoming Pretty and living in utopian cities was really all that terrible of an idea. I also couldn’t help but contrast this with "Harrison Bergeron" again; in Vonnegut's version, over the course of a few short pages, we're utterly convinced of the evils of a uniform society. In Westerfeld's rendering of the same (by now, slightly tired) Aesop, becoming Pretty never really seems that terrible, fundamentally.Perhaps this is because we see the world through Tally's eyes, and Tally is meant to be a traitor to the Smoke and not a true believer. I think this made her a poor choice of point-of-view character, although I found her problematic as a character for other reasons, too. Tally is downright catty toward her friend Shay, despite the fact that their relationship is the most compelling one in the book—certainly more nuanced, believable, and interesting than Tally’s contrived romance with a Smokie named David. There’s a certain ugly (heh) glee in Shay's eventually destruction, not to mention in the way David and Tally both speak and think of her. This made Tally very difficult to empathize with and, more, made her a poor model for adolescent readers. Here, Westerfeld could have given us a still-complex but more functional (and realistic) model of adolescent friendship; instead, he resorts to sexist tropes centered on female competition over men.Despite these problems, the novel still had its moments, particularly in the first section before Tally leaves for Smoke; in those first hundred pages, the novel seemed full of potential. The pacing does suffer a bit in its saggy, slow midsection, but otherwise Uglies is action-packed and fairly compelling. I just wish it had been more convincing, too.
    • 5/5
      I've read this before, but never finished the series. Am now "reading" the audio version. Fantastic. Loved it. Can't wait to read more of this classic dystopian story of what if we all turned (were made) pretty (biologically "perfect") at 16 ...
    • 3/5
      Tally lives in a future society where everyone is turned "pretty" on their 16th birthday via an extensive medical procedure ("the operation") that changes everyone's features to fit what is considered an evolutionary ideal of beauty (e.g., large eyes suggesting vulnerability). But a few weeks before Tally's 16th birthday, she meets a new friend Shay who suggest that there's an alternate -- a better one -- than becoming pretty. There's a secret society that lives off the grid where everyone remains "ugly" for life and thus true to themselves. Tally needs to consider if what she wanted her whole life thus far -- to be pretty -- is really the future in store for her.As dystopias go, this one is pretty lame. Yes, more than halfway into the book, we do finally learn that "the operation" has a huge side effect in that it leaves lesions in the brains of those who undergo it, leaving them "pretty" but also essentially brain damaged, meaning they are more easily kept in check by their overlords ... who don't seem to do anything beyond keep the peace. But it takes so long to get to the reveal, that most of the book is like sort of 'yeah, yeah, boo hoo' to a society that has technological advances yet is friendly to the environment (greener sources of transport, universal vegetarianism, etc.) and where there are no wars. The characters are no more interesting. Tally and Shay, along with numerous other characters, really have zero personality. An obligatory love triangle is included, which has zero passion behind it. All that recommends the book is the plot, which is okay overall, but bogged down with slow-moving sections focused on extraneous details and repetition of the same thing over and over (e.g., Tally repeatedly feeling guilty). The book ends not exactly on a cliffhanger, but clearly with a lot left unexplored, as this book is the beginning of series. I for one am not at all interesting in continuing on with said series. However, the books are popular, so clearly they resonant with someone -- perhaps the teen audience for which they are intended.
    • 4/5
      3.5 starsWhen anyone turns 16 years old, they have a surgery they have been anticipating all their lives - they are turned "pretty" and are able to live a life of fun and parties all the time. Tally's best friend Peris turned 16 a few months before Tally, so Tally is lonely without him. She meets Shay, another "ugly", and they hang out until their mutual birthday. Suddenly, close to their birthday, Shay announces to Tally that she doesn't want to turn "pretty" and there is a place they can escape to. She wants Tally to come with her. Tally refuses, but after Shay runs away anyway, Tally is forced to help the authorities find Shay. Will Tally betray Shay? It was good. It's YA, so it's fast to read, and the chapters often end on a note where you want to keep reading. In fact, the entire book ended that way, on a slight cliffhanger, so I hope to get to the 2nd book in the trilogy, Pretties, fairly soon. Definitely an enjoyable read.