What? ¿The Seprona (Natural Protection) guys? Yeah, what's... An owl
stuck in a pipe?
Ok, ok then, Liber
Helicopter to the rescue, onward!
Hi people! Welcome once again to my channel, and,
as always, we're going to talk ABOUT BOOKS!
Since the last books I spoke of
were rather dark and
gloomy and scary,
today we'll try something different:
Teen-YA literature,
romance, a little bit of dystopia... Today's
books are the MATCHED trilogy, by Ally Condie.
As always, I'll read the
synopsis: "Never challenge the game of love."
"In Cassia's world, the authorities
decide everything. Who you must love,
which job you'll have, even the time of
your death. Cassia has never questioned
the decissions that have been made for her, not
even when she's told that her
"perfect match",
the person with whom she'll have to spend
the rest of her life, is Xander, her
best friend.
The problems come later, when
due to a strange computer error,
in the microcard assigned to her by
the authorities, another guy's face appears,
the face of mysterious Ky. With a mix of
shock and curiosity, Cassia starts
investigating. What if this mistake wasn't
random? What if the person of her life
is not who she's been told?
In her search for an answer to all these
questions, Cassia will have to face
an impossible choice: between perfection
and passion, between Xander and Ky, between
the only life she knows and the path
that nobody ever dared to follow
before..."
And you'll say: "Nyeeh another trilogy
of teenage love with a love
triangle and dystopia and a girl
that's going to save the world with
the power of love nyaaah..."
Well, no. See, MATCHED has a special
thing: it's not entirely dystopian,
at least in the beginning. It turns out that
they live in a perfect society;
the protagonist is happy, her friends are
too... The problem comes when she
starts wanting something she can't have,
and that's when conflict arises,
as in many great novels. MATCHED was
published in 2010 in USA, and then
arrived to Spain in 2011. They say that,
before it was published, Disney had
bought the rights to make
a movie or a series. Well, it's been 7
years since then and I haven't seen
any of it. I guess they'll come up
with something eventually. Look at the cover.
I liked it a lot: it's
very simple, white, spotless,
precisely like the society it introduces us to.
A most round font in
color green, much like that of a monitor,
and this is relevant because, in this
society, people can't write, can't
dance, I actually doubt they can sing,
but they know how to type,
read, they know a little of History
and Biology, enough for them to
function in the Society.
Look, we have our protagonist here,
inside some sort of marble,
a glass prison, in her green dress,
which is the one she wears to
the Matching Celebration. That's how
the story begins. This theme of
colors and little crystal capsules
is quite relevant to the story,
because every citicen in
MATCHED's Society carries a pill box
with them. Every box has
3 pills: a green, a blue and a red one.
The blue and red ones's function are not
really known, but they must take
the green one whenever they're told.
That's why each of these books
displays the theme of the 3
pills.
I have the book's old edition, which is
now outdated, and that's why I still
haven't bought the third one, so I don't know
how the series end, despite how much
I liked them. At first, the books was
all pretty and whitey, and then they came up
with an all-black edition, which
completely ruined the whole aesthetic,
in my opinion.
I suppose they were trying to imitate The Hunger Games.
And so, if you look for MATCHED
by Ally Condie now, you'll find
the black ones. I doubt there have
been more significant changes, however.
In this Society, every person has
a card with their information,
their name, their blood type probably,
their family, their province,
favorite leisure activity,
favorite sport activity (perhaps
swimming or hiking), their
skills, their job, if they
have one... At a certain age, when they
finish their studies
and according to their skills, young
citizens aren't only assigned a job by the Society:
they're also assigned a partner. Everyone
goes to a ceremony,
all excited, because there they'll be
told whom they will marry and
spend the rest of their life with. Since that
ceremony and the matching process are
based on reliable algorythms of
compatibility and shared likes,
people attend unafraid. They say "Ooh, so cool!
They'll find the best
possible match for me." As
you'll understand, that saves them
a lot of headache.
Perhaps many in this world
would be thankful to have
such a ceremony, if it were accurate.
But I understand why many would be
quite scared.
So, after getting their job
and their match, the young citizens
move in with their partners, live their
lives peacefully, with their little house
on a street planted with cute trees,
Society working like a
well-oiled machine, and then,
of course, they have children, these kids
are classified by the same process... That's
how it goes. Though in this Society
everybody dies when they reach
80 years old.
It's said that it's actually a good age
to die, because you're old enough
to have contributed to society, to
have earned a proud feeling
of having lived a full life,
and it's right before your body
begins to decay, the afflictions
appear, along with nasty illnesses...
So 80 years old is the perfect
time to leave.
So Cassia's grandfather, Samuel,
has always been a man who followed
the Society's rules, but also took them
with a grain of salt. He's going to reach
his 80 years,
so his whole family visits him
so they can share the last dinner with him
and, before they say their goodbyes forever,
he gets a moment alone with
Cassia and tells her secrets
that will change her view of Society forever.
It's not exactly a dystopia,
more like a creepy utopia, at least
in the first book.
So, our protagonist lives in
an ultra-perfect Society, whose
name is precisely this: The SOCIETY. This is
the organization that controls everything.
Every second of the characters' lives,
as well as the lives of everyone who
lives here.
The ones who carry out the
Society's will are the Officials. The thing is,
you can make choices in this society,
but instead of choosing
between a hundred of options, for example,
you can pick between 2 or 3 at most. A detail that
quite creeped me was when my mother
read the book and said "Hey,
this Society is
not that bad.
Everyone has a job, everything is
tidy and in order, there's no fighting,
no quarrels, nothing. People are sorted
according to their skills and their
personality where they'll work best,
where they'll be of most use to the
Society."
And crap, that's true, when you think about it.
Really, for a price,
you obtain an almost perfect Society, so
to speak: it's like a utopia. No
utopia comes for free, but here we are.
And sure, that's when I truly understood
the really dreadful side of
MATCHED: The Society
presented to us is very
seductive, so perfect and white
and spotless, with little choices you
can make to canalize your life,
but nothing strays out of the path
marked by the Society, everything goes well.
((Cat)) I recommend this books if
you want such a trilogy, sort of
YA dystopia, with its romance, its
teenage angst, and the concept of a
society that some will see as
a perfect dream, and others as
a nightmare,
it all depends on the reader. If you've
already read the book, please comment
your opinions below, because I'm
really interested in knowing what you thought
of this Society, which perks you
see in it, and what parts of it
frightened you.
And if you haven't read it,
if you're interested in the genre,
give it a look, because it's not
a thick book, it's quickly read,
very pleasant. Food for thought. If you
liked this video, if you enjoy
my channel, please subscribe, comment,
hit LIKE... Whatever you
prefer; I appreciate all of it very much.
Oh, I almost forgot! I'll host a
GIVEAWAY on Twitter soon. A
GIVEAWAY is quite like a raffle:
you'll have to retweet a tweet I'd
write, along with a specific hashtag, and
when the closing time comes,
I'll use an internet algorythm
to pick a random winner, and this
winner will get a FREE illustration
from me! A raffle, indeed.
:D
So, whoever wants to participate,
please follow me on TWITTER:
@LiberLibelula , like this very
channel, and that way you'll know
when I do the GIVEAWAY, and you'll be able
to enter if you wish to.
Well, I'm happy to be
with you all one week more. Until
next week, and thank you so much for
watching. Bye-bye!
Damn, I forgot! I promised
a guy pal from
Twitter that I'd say hi to him in my
next video. I'd already taken off my makeup,
changed my clothes, I was editing the video...
Suddenly I remembered, and said "Shit!"
LUIH, LUIH, sorry man, I forgot to
say hello to you LUIH,
have a good day, have fun man,
goodbye!
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