We Are All Ugly

Uglies

Author:
Scott Westerfeld
Publisher:
Simon Pulse 2005
Number of Pages: 
425
Review: “What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.” What negates beauty? Is it our perceptions that we imply upon others? Is it ingrained upon us from childhood? Is it socially instilled within ourselves or something that is essentially one’s own and no one else’s? But more importantly can we use beauty to control the emotions and actions of other peoples, or on a greater scale, a whole country? These are the questions that Scott Westerfeld asks in his novel called Uglies.

Uglies takes place in a futuristic earth where humans are grouped into five categories: Littlies, Uglies, New Pretties, Middle Pretties and Cumblies. Uglies pretty much look like humans from the 21^st century. Flawed, different, unique; and taught at a young age that everyone deserves to be pretty, every ugly at the age of 16 will go through a series of surgeries to make them pretty. Tally is just a few months away from becoming a New Pretty when she meets Shay, the rebellious and adventurous new friend who’s also waiting to become a Pretty but unlike Tally, she is not looking forward to the surgery. On the day before her scheduled surgery, Shay decides to run away begging Tally to go with her. When Tally refuses and goes in for her surgery she’s given an ultimatum: Find Shay and expose the Ugly Society called The Smoke or remain Ugly forever. Tally must make a decision, one that will alter her future forever.

I must admit I didn’t like the first half of Uglies. In fact I hated it.  It wasn’t the concept that I hated but Tally. Talk about your typical shallow female. She complained all the time about her flaws, other people’s flaws and then I realized, of course she was complaining, she lives in a society that calls normal people UGLY! When I got over the fact that she’s supposed to be shallow I started to warm up to the story, by the time Tally got to the Smoke, I loved it.

Tally is smart. She knows wrong from right, yet she lives in this society that makes decisions for her. When Shay comes along and shows her a life that is beyond the ugly/pretty boundaries she begins to open her mind to the fact that perfection isn’t always perfect. She’s a strong female character. Once she’s out of the ugly mindset she’s not afraid to be herself, and she’s not afraid to embrace the beauty of the people around her and of her own beauty. I loved how she developed from a little girl to a strong independent young lady.

In terms of the other characters, Shay was a great ally and sometimes enemy of Tally. The rivalry between the two as well as the friendship and love they have for one another makes the characters realistic. Yes they are best friends but even best friends fight. As for the main love interest, I like the fact that it wasn’t instalove. This relationship was a slow development. I felt that David was a good match for Tally, he challenged her, and fought with her beliefs, and let her make her own decisions. He was never pushy with his beliefs and she was respectful of his opinions as well. Where Shay gushed over David, Tally actually listened to what he had to say. I liked that contrast between the two friends.

The plot was interesting. To be able to control a whole population by telling them they’re ugly and they have to look a certain way in order to feel accepted is not too far off from where our society is heading now. Everywhere we go we are constantly bombarded with advertisements, movies, even books that say we have to look a certain way in order to have fun, get a mate and live a full wealthy life. More and more people are opting for Plastic Surgery these days, if we could somehow get that kind of extreme surgery for free I’m pretty sure the number of plastic surgeries performed per year would sky rocket. This false sense of happiness can be used against us into making us do things we really don’t want to do after all.

Scott Westerfeld really put a lot of great plot twists and ideas in this novel.  The Uglies society is something we should pay close attention too because the way society is shaped upon looks these days this may very well be our future if we’re not careful and don’t show people that everyone is beautiful in their own way.  I highly recommend you checking out the first book in this series and I plan on continuing with it in my future reads.

Happy Reading!