Skip to main content

Kiera Cass: The Selection - The Selection Book 1

The Selection by Kiera Cass is essentially dystopian style The Bachelor. What if the prince of a country had to choose his wife on live TV from a pool of eligible girls? America Singer is one of those girls. She is fairly low on the caste totem pole (a 6 to the royal 1) and is in love with a boy in her neighborhood. She entered the contest to appease his concerns that he was holding her back. She enters, tries to spoil him, and he breaks up with her. America is then chosen for the Selection and meets Prince Maxon who is nothing like she expected. Will America make it to the end of the Selection?

Ultimately, this book was not the most enjoyable book I've ever read. It wasn't terrible, but I found it predictable, and I wasn't impressed with the ending. I liked the overall idea, even if it wasn't all that original, and I personally have no interest in reality shows like The Bachelor. I thought America's name was unoriginal, and I found her character a little obnoxious. It was also written from the first person which made it rather obvious that America wasn't going to wash out. If you really want to write a contest story where the reader can't guess what's going to happen, don't write in the first person! It was pretty obvious to me that America was going to resist liking Maxon and still hold out her hope for the other boyfriend, and that said boyfriend would show back up, which he did. 

As I stated before, the ending was inconvenient. I feel like there are two kinds of conflict when looking at series: series level conflicts (conflicts that span an entire series) and book-level conflicts (issues that should be resolved within one book). The Selection doesn't seem to tie up any of the conflicts. The contest isn't over at the conclusion, there is still a rebellion, and America still likes both boys. I felt that at least the contest should have finished in the first book, not a narrowing down to the top few.

Overall, in talking about this book with my students (ironically several of my students read this just after I did), most of them liked it. The romance and the main character do seem to resonate with teenage readers. They didn't even really notice the predictability of the plot. My rating did not match theirs at all.

My rating:
  • PG
  • 3 Stars
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Brandon Sanderson: The Lost Metal - Wax & Wayne (Mistborn Era 2) Book 4

 I finally finished Mistborn era 2! I loved this series so much (though I think I love era 1 the most still). This story was an incredible addition to Scadrial's story. In this final installment, we pick up in Elendel at a time of great uncertainty. The outer cities are threatening war, their tentative alliance with the Malwish is falling apart over the Bands of Mourning, and Wax is still in the middle of all of it. Now serving on the senate, Wax is desperately trying to help the Elendel nobles maintain peace while hunting the Set. Unsuccessful thus far at locating his sister, the leader of the Set, Wax is still trying to uncover her plans. Can Wax, Marasi, and Wayne uncover the Set's plans before the invasion of Trell crushes Scadrial? This was a fitting conclusion for Mistborn's second era. I loved the character development we saw in each of the characters: Marasi, Wax, Wayne, and Steris. I love the involvement of some era 1 characters (one who I am not going to spoil), a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Brene Brown: Daring Greatly

Brene Brown is one of my favorite TED speakers of all time. I have listened to her TED talks numerous times and used them in my classroom each year. I love her message: that we can't have success, innovation, change, and creativity without first having vulnerability. I love that she is seeking to demystify vulnerability and teach what shame is and how it destroys our ability to accept ourselves and others. I am not normally into the self-help kind of books, but of the books I've read this year, this is one of my favorites! Daring Greatly  by Brene Brown discusses the concepts of shame and vulnerability and how we need vulnerability, but not shame. She gives strategies for combating shame and becoming "shame resilient." She gives strategies to use as parents, teachers, friends, and spouses. For one thing, I love Dr. Brown's Texan accent (she narrates the audiobook herself! 💗). Her voice and personality are all throughout this book. She is not afraid to use persona...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ruta Sepetys: The Fountains of Silence

I love historical fiction, so when my book club (of English teachers) picked this one, I was really excited to read it. The Fountains of Silence  by Ruta Sepetys is about a boy named Daniel Matheson who travels to Spain in the 1950s. The leader of Spain, Franco, is ruthless and has an iron hold on his people. Daniel's father is an oil tycoon who wants his son to take over the business, while his mother is from Spain. Daniel doesn't want to join his father's business. He wants to become a photographer. His goal while in Spain is to take pictures worthy enough of a contest that he's working on. While there, Daniel meets Ana, a maid at the Hilton Hotel he's staying at. Ana is assigned to Daniel's family and attends to their every need. Ana's family is poor and this is an incredible job opportunity for her. Ana's family needs this job. Ana and Daniel become friends and start to fall in love with each other, something Ana seems hesitant about and Daniel kno...
Post a Comment
Read more