What if you lived in a society that controlled every aspect of your life? Who you loved, where you worked, and when you died? Enter the “Matched” trilogy, where the society is actually like that.
I picked this book up on a whim when I was on vacation in Arizona, hoping for something good to read. What really drew me in was the cover: a girl with wavy hair in a green prom styled dress encased in a glass globe. I’ll admit I just bought the book for the dress on the cover. However, the bibliophile in my head demanded that I actually read the book, and I actually found it enjoyable.
The “Matched” series follows the story of Cassia Reyes, a girl who was born in a society in a distant future where people find their fate controlled by the society. The first novel begins on the night of Cassia’s seventeenth birthday, where she attends her “matching” ceremony. In this society, when teenagers turn seventeen, they are required to be paired in a form of arranged marriage to their “perfect match” based on genetics and the society’s sorting.
The ceremony commences with each girl going up and meeting her match over the port or portal, which in this future seems to be some sort of television and communication device. When Cassia is called, she receives the surprise of a lifetime when she is matched with her best friend, Xander. Everything seems to be going swimmingly perfect, until Cassia goes over the courtship guidelines she was given and finds that Xander has been replaced by a new boy named Ky.
It’s from there that the plot turns into, as the praise given by MTV for “Matched” said, “Love Triangle+ struggle against the powers = perfect escape.” I could not agree more. The “Matched” trilogy draws you in with the idea that the society is perfect, and that nothing could be better until you realize that it can be.
The “Matched” trilogy is well written and suspenseful. While a bit slow at times, the anticipation turns out to be the sweetest surprise for the reader. Cassia’s journey from beginning to end was probably the best dystopian novel series I’ve read this year.
My recommendation: if you liked the Hunger Games, then you should definitely pick up the Matched trilogy. Now, I loved the Hunger Games, but the romantic-novel junkie I am was disappointed in the lack of romance in the series. Matched satisfied my appetite for the romance and made it a focal point in the novels as well as Cassia, Ky and Xander’s struggles to escape from the conformity of society and find themselves.
Cassia may seem similar to the fabled Katniss Everdeen and dare I say Bella Swan, but surprisingly unique in her own way that makes her human and has a quality that makes readers relate to her and make her a believable human being, unlike Katniss and especially unlike Bella. Katniss was a good character, but her story and her abilities did not relate to most in this age and Bella was… sorry, Twilight fans but she was barely even human. No one could relate to her, except in the first book, where she seemed vaguely like a normal seventeen year old girl.
I digress: the matched trilogy has something for everyone and can be enjoyable read to boys and girls and for those who are falling in love. The “Matched” trilogy has been completed as of November 13th, 2012, so if by chance you pick the first novel and enjoy it, you could possibly ask for the rest of the novels for Christmas without waiting another year with suspense.
