5.0 out of 5 stars
Page turner!
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on 31 July 2015
I loved this book! An amazing dystopian novel that was fast-paced, well-developed, and believable. It was hard to put down.
This story is told in first person from the view of the main character, Summer Greenwood, although it occasionally briefly switches to others to grow the plot line. Although that style is not typical of first person point of view stories as it can get confusing, I thought it was easy to follow here and the different perspectives further developed the plot line.
Summer is a young teen who gets captured to be part of secret human genetic experiments by Making Perfect, the huge genetic research corporation that controls the region where she lives. Summer is very smart. She is also not your typical YA heroine. She’s witty, honest, down-to-earth, quite out-spoken, an amazing problem solver, and has a deep sense of loyalty to the people she loves. She is also awkward, a bit insecure and self-conscious at times, especially in social situations. Although she does have unusual physical strength from Making Perfect’s enhancements, she isn’t in prime physical condition and uses her wit far more than her brawn, which is how she is able to navigate through Making Perfect’s brutal evaluations. Her free-spirit and sense of humor about her situation is really what sets her apart from the crowd.
Along with Summer, a bunch of other kids from her neighborhood are also captured by Making Perfect. One of these kids is Blayze. Something I really enjoyed was that, for the most part, Summer and Blayze’s relationship didn’t feel rushed. At the beginning it was awkward and a little flirty, but the relationship didn’t override the more important events of the story. They became friends first, and you never know if their relationship is going to develop into something more. The pace of their evolution was slow, felt quite real and their interactions never felt forced which is rare in most YA books.
This is what made this book really stand apart from many other dystopian novels in my view: First, I could get really attached to the characters. Every character in this book was different from the other, and I always found myself rooting for them whenever they faced conflict. Second, the villains were multi-dimensional. For example, in the case of Ian Cooper, the son of Making Perfect's CEO, his motivations for doing the things he did were just as clear as Summer’s. Despite the fact that his decisions had devastating consequences for many of the kids, he was also likable, and his story was so heartbreaking, that I often found myself rooting for him instead of the other way around. Third, the imagery made this story’s world come to life. From the detailed descriptions of the different Making Perfect facilities, to the smell of the piles of garbage in the Slump, and the mutations gone wrong, I could really see Summer’s world through her eyes. I thought the book found a good balance between describing the landscape in great detail and leaving things up to the reader's imaginations. Finally, Making Perfect’s genetic alterations put a bit of an X-men-like twist on the story, which was so cool. I’ve always been a sucker for stories about lab experiments, and this was right up my alley.
This book was packed full of surprises, thrilling, and I was impressed by how seamlessly everything fit together. The characters were unique and strong, and I got very attached to them very quickly. There were a few places here and there where I wanted to dig deeper into some of the character’s backgrounds and the lives of the people in the rest of Making Perfect’s region but I am hoping there will be another book. Imperfect is definitely worth the read!
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