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. . . .I honestly do not know what to say about this book. The reviews seemed so positive and this book was . . .
First off, Mrs. Oliver is a really good writer. Stylistically speaking, she is probably one of the best YA writers out there. Her writing is so raw and honest and it has so much depth. . . but the thing is there is just too much monologue. It was so BORING. Page after page talking about the dystopian blah blah blah. OH my gosh! There was like half a page of actual conversation between characters and then there were like five pages of Lena just telling one stupid story that could be summed up in one freakin paragraph. I mean, come on. Nothing happens 80% of the book. All Mrs. Olive does is TELLING instead of SHOWING. Lena tells the reader about her mother. Lena tells you about Rachel's past as being infected before she was cured. Lena even tells most of what happens to her and Alex. There is almost no conversation going on between the characters because 90% of the book Lena is telling the reader EVERYTHING. Stylistically I feel like a good 175 pages could have been cut from the book and it would have actually been a fast read. It was BORING. Literally the last fifty pages were the ONLY part of the book that got interesting, and even then when Alex is taking Lena in the Ward there were at least a good 20 pages that could have been cut out, Lena was just talking about random stuff that had NOTHING to do with what was going on. Mrs. Oliver writes well. . . for poetry, but not for novels. Her book drowned on and on and on.

However, I will add that Lena does change throughout the book. She grows to realize that everyone lied to her and she cannot go on living a lie. But it just seemed like it took forever. It was so slow. It was incessant monologue that just seemed not to go anywhere. She would say things like 'I explained what happened (insert situation) but actually wouldn't be talking, so it would be a boring paragraph about her telling Hanna something. I am just like, lazy writing much?! Why don't you just add a bit more character conversation instead of saying "I explained blah blah blah." It just got so annoying. Ten pages of monologue followed by two sentences of actual conversation. It was so boring (I know I already said that). Though I did like Lena, I didn't like how there was a lack of character conversation. Mrs. Oliver explained EVERYTHING, but she didn't SHOW anything, and that is my biggest beef with the book. Though Mrs. Oliver is a very gifted writer in terms of writing style (she is very unique), her dialogues could be elongated.