I liked The Selehttps://amzn.to/3RDkkXYction although I did not like the characters. How odd is that? I found the heroine, America Singer, whiny and all too immature. Her two love interests, Aspen, a lowly Six, and Maxon the prince were OK, but I found it impossible to believe that Maxon could be as clueless as he was described. (I could believe that Aspen was a sexist jerk.)
The Intriguing Parts
The most interesting parts of the book were the caste system, which was downright puzzling, and the idea that a big country (apparently a combination of the US, Canada, Mexico and part of Central America) could be governed by a king with a tiny lot of ministers.
The caste system allocated people to jobs by caste, into which one was born. Apparently a woman could marry up and join the higher caste, but if she married someone below then she moved down. People in castes Five, Six and Seven are poor with unpredictable livelihoods. Eights are wanderers, homeless people. Sixes and Sevens go to school while higher castes are home schooled / private schooled? / tutored.
The really goofy thing is that Fives are all artists. Huh? That makes no sense whatsoever. Sixes are servants. Fours work in factories or farm. I can go along with servants and factory workers being hereditary roles but artists? You either have artistic talent or you do not. The heroine’s brother has zero interest in art or music and wants to be a scientist. So in our mythical country he can’t be a scientist, however talented and good he might be, but he can be an artist, however untalented?
The government part was stupid. No congress or Imperial Senate or even a House of Lords, no governors, just the king and his family rule the country. No way, that simply would not work. There are hints that the Twos have political clout but no details. When I read dystopia I want details: How does it work, who gets what and why does it hold together.
I found it incredible that Prince Maxon would be so unaware of the realities in his country that he did not realize the lower castes went hungry. Then he announced that the girls in the Selection would get a lower allowance with the difference going to feed the poor for oh, maybe a week or two. He made an appeal on television for the upper castes to donate, but how long will that last?
Lots of Pretty Clothes and Hunky Guys
I think one reason I enjoyed this was that I read it when traveling in the evenings after long days of yucky business meetings. Something light, fluffy and with lots of clothes and hunky guys filled the bill.
Another reason was that the book reminded me so much of two books I enjoyed, A Posse of Princesses by Sherwood Smith and The Hunger Games. The girls compete as in The Hunger Games but losers don’t die, they actually get rewarded with higher status. The winner gets to marry our clueless friend, Prince Maxon.
Just as in A Posse of Princesses the contestants include the requisite selfish beauty, Celeste, the narrator/heroine, the heroine’s good friend. What we don’t have are any of the other characters or real interesting relationships. The characters act like sixth graders at their first school dance.
I enjoyed this while reading it, but as I was writing this review it struck me how incredibly silly it was and how very poorly written. None of the characters were believable and the dialogue was horrible. I will probably read the sequel, The Elite but I’ll wait for another business trip where I need something brainless with pretty clothes and hunky guys.
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