Partials (Partials #1) by Dan Wells

Synopsis: "The human race is all but extinct after a war with Partials—engineered organic beings identical to humans—has decimated the population. Reduced to only tens of thousands by RM, a weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune, the survivors in North America have huddled together on Long Island while the Partials have mysteriously retreated. The threat of the Partials is still imminent, but, worse, no baby has been born immune to RM in more than a decade. Our time is running out.

Kira, a sixteen-year-old medic-in-training, is on the front lines of this battle, seeing RM ravage the community while mandatory pregnancy laws have pushed what's left of humanity to the brink of civil war, and she's not content to stand by and watch. But as she makes a desperate decision to save the last of her race, she will find that the survival of humans and Partials alike rests in her attempts to uncover the connections between them—connections that humanity has forgotten, or perhaps never even knew were there."

Title: Partials
Series: Partials #1
Genre: Science Fiction, YA, Romance-y-ish
Pages: 468
Ages: 14+ (just because it can be a little confusing...and guns and blood)
My Rating: 4 Stars
My Word(s): MadeMeThink, Science-y, DanWellsIsVerySmart
My Fave Quote: 
"Do I really know what I'm doing?" (378).            

Okay, wow....so many things went on in this book! :O

Let's start with the plot shall we? So it's basically about this young girl medic, Kira, who wants to save humanity from the infectious RM killing newborn babies. All humans believe that their computer-generated army people that once helped them fought for previous wars have now decided to kill all of the human population by spreading RM. These army people are called Partials (partially human I suppose) and throughout the whole story, Kira risks her life to find a cure for RM so humanity can live on, yet Kira later finds out that things were not always what she thought they were. Kira goes on some crazy adventures with her friends to find the cure and save humanity because that's the only way that she would finally get to live in peace. However, once Kira finds out new things, she realizes she will never look at herself as the person she once was again. Partials is one of those books that makes you stop and think what if? Throughout the story, we get to witness Kira's life turn upside down from beginning to end, and I think it was super fascinating to think what would life actually be like if this actually happened?

So now let's go to my opinion of this book. This is the most thought out plot that I've ever read, and I've now nominated Dan Wells to be the smartest author I know; seriously I could never think of even writing about all this scientific-y stuff going on with Kira's tests as se tries to find an antidote. Also, Wells thought of every little aspect that would probably happen to something like this if it were real life,-rebellions, the Voice, the Senate lying- all of this could easily happen in real life if something as crazy as the Partials being alive were to actually be true. I personally loved this plot because it was so different from anything I've ever read and it really expanded my line of thinking. I would never think of something like this ever happening to us humans, but now I'm thinking that it easily could.

Since I could go on forever writing about the plot, I've decided to quickly move on to the characters. In every book I read, the plot and the characters are the first priority to how I rate the book; I think it's how a book can be so good. Partials fit both aspects perfectly to what I would like to read in a book. All the characters were totally different. Like, Jayden the serious and skillful soldier; and Marcus, the humorous-serious when he wanted to be-boyfriend. I personally loved Xochi and Haru because they both made me laugh just because of the funny things that they said without meaning to! And lastly, Kira who was both brave and smart and selfless because she was willing to risk her life for a cure. These characters and many more blew me away because of how different they all are.

Through all Kira's adventures, I wanted to either scream at her or love her or jump up with joy. Any book that can make me feel different emotions to the main character really deserves higher than 3 stars. All in all, this book REALLY blew my expectations away, and the cliffhanger ending just makes me want to read the sequel, Fragment, as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, I'll be like this before I get to read Fragments:
★★★★

Reached (Matched #3) by Ally Condie

Synopsis: "After leaving Society to desperately seek 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 is assigned undercover in Central city, Ky outside the borders, an airship pilot with Indie. Xander is a medic, with a secret. All too soon, everything shifts again."



Title: Reached
Series: Matched #3
Genre: Science Fiction Romance, Dystopian
Pages: 512
Ages: 12+
Date I Finished: July 29th, 2013
My Rating: 3 Stars
My Word: GREAT OVERALL PLOT

Review

Reached, the final book of the series Matched.

I wish I liked it better, I really did.

I was going to give this book 4 stars, but then I thought better of it. Here's my explanation of why I rated it:

Good:
-The plot. I like the creativity of the plague, and how when you go "still", you can still hear your surroundings. Also, the way that you can communicate with another "still" person in your mind. But, the only way to communicate with them is when the other is about to die. Also, the whole Rising and they're plans were very intriguing to me. The whole idea of all the puzzling pieces, such as The Rising's plan for the plague, the meaning of 'the pilot' that Oker told Xander, Nea Lei, the Red Garden Day, etc. All the puzzle pieces were figured out and fit together throughout the book which made me pleasantly surprised to have the book's very own unexpected twists.

-In addition, I liked the little bit of suspense with Ky having the 'you know what'.

-The poetry was so beautifully written, it made me wish I was a poet like Cassia haha.

Ok, here comes the bad: The character development. Ever since the beginning of the series I knew there was something off with the characters, I just couldn't figure what.

Now I know, it's that some characters have a lack of human feelings. Like, Xander isn't even the slightest bit jealous of Ky? Or that Cassia doesn't even shed a tear when she finds out her papers are (view spoiler)gone?!?! Or that Ky and Cassia don't even feel the urge to come hug each other once they finally see each other again after what seemed like forever for them, although the plague is a warning to not get too near each other? Literally, all Ky said during that moment was "I see Cassia." Some parts, though, they did show a little of their loving feelings, and I thought it was cute the way Ky and Cassia shared poems. But, the list could go on for lack of feelings.

Don't get me wrong, some characters, such as Indie and Oker were pretty well thought out and had a nice edge in their personality, but Xander, Ky, and Cassia just didn't feel enough emotion.

Next, the love triangle. It wasn't that great, because, as I noted earlier, Xander wasn't even jealous, nor did he try anything to win Cassia's heart. He kind of just gave up, so I can assure you the love triangle didn't go very far.

Lastly, the story was way too stretched out in the beginning, it was kind of hard to continue reading it in a longer sitting. Knowing me, I like more fast-paced, action books, so I guess this just wasn't the one for me:/.

That's about it! This is more of my constructed, criticized reviews because this book just didn't fill me with that emotional happiness in the end, although it was happy. I just sort of forgot about it in the end. Nothing that made me keep my thoughts on the book after I read it, like what happens with my 5 star rated books. This book missed some things, but overall, I liked it.
★★★