Specials
User reviews
think Specials is my favorite in the Uglies trilogy. There's just something about the Specials that wow me. Their brains are wired differently and Tally undergoes yet another dramatic change, physically and mentally. Also, this book has the best ending. There's a cool action scene and the possibility of what to come is extremely interesting. I love Scott Westerfeld's writing and I'm totally going to read more of his books.
Specials is an awesome ending to the Uglies trilogy. In it Tally Youngblood is learning to be a Special in the special circumstances unit. A Special is a person who gets a surgery akind of super human, their eyesight is amazing, their hearing is better than a "hawk's". The features of a special is different too. Their eyes are decribed as wolf-like, their skin is flawless, and the sound of their voice is changed. The author describes their voices as sharp. The special is also equipped with razor sharp nails and teeth as well as superior musculature. People who have seen Specials are generally scared or creeped out. This particular group that Tally is in is called the cutters (they are special specials) their job is too keep the "cure" from coming to the city, to keep an eye on the smokies, and keep the amount of runaways to a minumum. Tally is not alone her friends are right by her side. Untill the "cure" gets a hold of the other cutters.
i really liked this book, and the author.The book was so detailed it was like a movie playing in my head.
When last we saw our heroine, Tally Youngblood, she had already been through a number of changes. Classified as an Ugly -- like all pre-sixteen year olds -- she had wanted nothing more than to have the surgery that all kids got on their sixteenth birthday; the surgery that would make her a Pretty.
And then she got the operation, and all that came with being pretty: the symmetrical face; the flawless skin; the rounded eyes; the fuller lips; the brain lesions.
Yes, brain lesions. Scars in the brain tissue that keep all the Pretties "pretty-minded bubbleheads", not thinking too hard about anything, happy to go along with the rules. Pliable. It's a utopia for all -- the citizens, and the city government as well, run behind the scenes by a third over-class of citizens: Special Circumstances. One wouldn't think that the government would intentionally perform brain surgery on all its citizens. It's one out of many visions of Westerfeld that could be considered the most outlandish -- until I saw the CDC reports linking vaccine Thimerosal to outbreaks of autism.
Tally enters prettyhood knowing full well the dangers and risks; but going in, she also knew her friend David, a boy born outside the city, would smuggle in the cure for her. But once she was pretty, she wasn't sure she wanted the cure, and so when the two pills arrived she shared them with her new boyfriend, Zane. The results weren't good. The two pills were a cocktail -- one was a mix of nanos designed to eat away at the brain lesions; the other, a harmless chemical designed to stop the nanos. Zane got the first one. Together, they both became bubbly -- clear-thinking. But the nanos continued to eat away at Zane's brain, damaging him. Tally's clear-headedness had nothing to do with the pills at all -- she had thought her own way out of prettyheadedness.
Now, after having been captured by her former best friend Shay and taken to Special Circumstances, Tally has been remade yet again. Her muscles tissue has been replaced with artificial polymers, her bones with ceramics, and computer circuitry runs beneath it all. She's stronger and faster. Her reflexes are superhuman. And she finally sees why the Specials are in the right. As a member of Shay's special subsect of Specials, the Cutters (named because they like to literally cut themselves to experience the high of brain chemicals the activity induces), she again runs into Zane, who was also captured at the end of Pretties but who is still pretty-minded -- and still damaged
-- Robert Louis StevensonÂ
As an endin to the series, it wasn't a let down. It had my crying in some parts, and gave a good outcome. Who dies,what happens to Dr. Cable, and everything else is answered and well, all around, its a good ending to a exellent series and deserves to be read. The only downfall to it though is the ending. When Tally ends up going with David, and with Zane well, not there anymore, its kinda dissapointing and could have been better, but still exellent
Still a great book...After Uglies and Pretties witch you just could'nt stop reading, Specials just keeps getting better.
Specials is more dark than the to first books. Tally has been taken by the special circumstances and has been transformes once more. She beacomes a dark weapon and fights for the city, witch she always was againts!!! After being attact by the Smokies (her old friends) one of her partner's taken. She must bring him back, but along the way things doesn't turn the way she wished. She discovers something big, an other city...
Specials is verry exciting, a war between to city, a war within Tally, etc...Her world will never be the same...
Still a book verry easy to read, verry exciting and alot of dark action.
Read it!!!
Kath
The Uglies series never slows, which reoccurs in Specials. It's so frusturating to watch Tally finally get a grasp of her own thinking, only to see her thrown back into a new surgery that changes her yet again. But I think that is what makes Specials so addicting. Just when I start to think I can predict what will happen, everything changes.
Specials is just as adventurous as the others, maybe even more-so now that Tally is practically a superhuman. I felt that this book spent more time describing the mental games and processes within Tally than the others. Instead of focusing primarily on events and the grand scheme of things, Specials spent time describing everything from Tally's perspective, the mastermind behind everything.
To me, Specials is the most detailed and well thought out of the series, and made me extremely hungry for the next book, Extras.
Loved it of course! 4/5
I enjoyed Uglies, didn't care for Pretties, and Specials got it right again. Tally is a special, again against her will she was made into something that is not "her." Shay surprises in this book, Zane is the best and the other cutters make surprising decisions. This is the first book of the series where I didn't know what was coming and I was anxiously waiting to see what happened. The "ending" is appropriate and heartwarming in a way. I am now on to Extras!
"Specials", the third book in Scott Westerfelds Uglies series, follows Tally in her new role as a "Special". Shay is now her boss and she feels contempt for anyone not "Special", including her boyfriend Zane. Shay, Tally and their group of "cutters" are charged with finding the new "smoky" settlement and stemming the tide of cured "pretty" runaways from the city.
Even though Tally is now one of the ruling class, she is still questioning authority and pulling even more dangerous pranks than ever before one near the beginning of the book sets off something that hasnt happened since rusty time a full out war between cities.
Again, Tally must overcome societal norms and be true to herself. Because she has a weaponized body, the story is full of action which reads quickly but is not as interesting to me personally. Brainwashing as a plot point can be quite convenient, but often makes characters act in strange ways that can simply be explained away would seem like lazy writing in any other book, but here it didnt bother me (too) much. Still, the story comes to a satisfying conclusion and you feel like you're leaving a friend when you read the last page.
Reprinted here with author's permission
As a shocking turn of events (as you may remeber from the end of "Pretties"), tally has become a Special, her once-greatest enemy. And even though everything is icy and fine, is life really worth living with that hole where Zane used to be (and wher on earth is he by the way? shouldn't he be done with his surge by now?). And now that she is fighting against what she once stood for, is there hope for Tally to find her destiny. Is it really Tally thats rising through all this special-speed and danger, or is someone still holding the controld on her mind?
I was very happy with the way this series ended up. I think this was supposed to be the conclusion of a trilogy, but if I'm thinking correctly I believe Extras is coming out next month, which would make it a series. I would be very happy to read that one as well! Scott Westerfeld is a great author and I've enjoyed these books very much. Always page turners and always exciting.
Specials, like other books, follows Tally Youngblood, now a member of Special Circumstance's prized group of Cutters. Though Tally's mind has been altered enough to agree with all of the things she does for Special Circumstances she still has lingering memories of her time with The Smoke and throughout the plot, begins again to think like a rebel. When her and Shay break into the Armory in order to help out a friend, the world begins to literally crash down around Tally. A war between cities breaks out and Tally is the only one who can save anything...or anyone.
This book was probably the most exciting for me. Uglies was a great introduction to the series and though Pretties moved a little slowly for my liking it was still pretty good, but Specials was the most action packed. I really liked this one and any fan of Scott Westerfeld's will enjoy it as well.
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