November 22, 2012

Review: Reached by Ally Condie

Reached (Matched #3)
Author: Ally Condie
Publisher: Dutton
Publication Date: November 13, 2012
Pages: 512
Source: Hardcover/Own

After leaving Society and desperately searching for the Rising—and each other—Cassia and Ky have found what they were looking for, but at the cost of losing each other yet again: Cassia has been assigned to work for the Rising from within Society, while Ky has been stationed outside its borders. But nothing is as predicted, and all too soon the veil lifts and things shift once again.

In this gripping conclusion to the #1 New York Times-bestselling Matched Trilogy, Cassia will reconcile the difficulties of challenging a life too confining, seeking a freedom she never dreamed possible, and honoring a love she cannot live without.

*Review contains spoilers!*

Review: I really felt like this was a satisfying ending to the trilogy! I enjoyed it. I definitely didn't see the book going the way it did but for me it made it all the better. I really enjoyed the 3 POV's between Xander, Ky & Cassia. It really worked well for this book because I know many of us have been wanting Xander's POV along with Ky's and Cassia's. Even though I'm Team Ky I really did enjoy Xander's POV. I always wondered what he would think about and just what things were like from his perspective. It also worked well because they ARE the three main characters and they all were stationed in different places for a while so we really got to see how things shaped up from within all three different places. 

Xander. I really think he was my favorite perspective to read in this book! It was first of all, a fresh perspective on everything, which I really enjoyed. Second, we finally got to see how he thinks and what secrets he was hiding. He was also the one who I saw that was always trying to do the right thing even though he knew sometimes it could get him in trouble. I was actually shocked to find out he was in The Rising. I know I should have picked up on it in Crossed during that conversation he had with Cassia, but I didn't. I'm usually really good at picking up on things but I just completely overlooked that. I'm glad he was though. He was completely dedicated to The Rising for the longest time until he found it better to believe in neither The Society or The Rising. But more importantly, he was dedicated to his role in The Rising, which was helping the patients who contracted the Plague. Even when he found it better to not fully believe in The Rising either he was still completely dedicated to helping the people. He was so good at his job. And even when everything seemed to be turning for the worst with no hope to save them Xander still had that hope. He kept going. He was also still in love with Cassia for the longest time in this book as well. I was very happy to see him grow out of that once he realized he was never going to be her choice. And in the end he found happiness with someone else. I was very satisfied with his ending!  

Ky. He was really only in The Rising because of Cassia. While he was flying planes throughout the first half of the book all he could think about was how really wanted to just take one of them and just pick up Cassia and run off together. But even with those thoughts constantly running through his head he still stuck through it and did what he was assigned to do. I also loved his friend and fellow Pilot Indie, who we met in Crossed. She was his best friend throughout the book and she was really there for him when he needed someone. She also did the huge task of getting Cassia out of Central and Xander out of Camas so that the three of them were together after they figured out what happened with the Plague. I was so disappointed that she died because of the Plague shortly after. I was also so sad that Ky came down with the Plague as well. But I was very happy that Xander and Cassia figured out what the cure was and cured him. I was gonna be so freaking sad if he died. So glad he didn't!

Cassia. She really struggled throughout the book. At the beginning she was fine and doing her role for The Rising. But then she had to take the Red Pill and come to find out she's not immune to it. For a majority of the book she was struggling to remember things. Specifically the Red Garden Day of which her grandfather left on his microcard as his memory of her. That specific memory kept haunting her throughout the whole book. And the memory only came back piece by piece. But that's the thing. Cassia got her memory back. Normally when you take the red pill you forget and never get your memory back. We later found out that her getting her memory back dealt with the fact that she never took the green pill. I'm really glad Cassia got her memory back. I'm also happy she figured out what everyone was missing for the cure. That girl is smart and she knew she was missing something for a while. I was shocked though at what the Red Garden Day memory was finally revealed as. Come to find out, Cassia was the one who sorted the abberations and such into the system to be Matched. She's the reason Ky ended up as a Match to her in the first place. But she never remembered it until she was trying to remember that day because she had taken the Red Pill on that day too. OMG! 

I thought this was a fantastic conclusion to the trilogy! 

5 Stars!