Specials

Westerfeld, S. (2006). Specials. New York: Simon Pulse.

This is the third book in the popular Uglies series featuring Tally Youngblood. Tally has become part of a group of surgically enhanced super humans called the “Cutters”. She has been programmed to fight the Uglies and the Pretties, but a small part of her remembers something different. She has the inner struggle between what she thinks she should do now and what he brain is telling her to do. I wish I had started with the first book in this series. Specials is a stand alone book, but reading the two previous books would have been helpful in character development. This book will be especially popular with 14-18 year old girls. This would be great for an after school book study program. The author has a list of discussion questions on his website that can facilitate the discussions. This is science fiction at its best. It is very far removed from the real world as the main character has been turned into a super human and has been programmed to fight. At the same time we see some real world traits as Tally struggles with right and wrong.