Blog #2 2/4/09

The book that I am currently reading is The Pretties by Scott Westerfeld. In this book, the main character Tally Youngblood, tries to overcome a struggle in her life. In her world, everyone is "pretty" as in they have surgery to make them perfect and their brains are altered so that they will want to be pretty. Pretty means that you do not think hard about anything, but everyone starts out ugly. Before Tally became pretty she joined the Smokies, a runaway group of uglies, and they made a cure to being pretty-minded. After getting the surgery, Tally took the pills with her boyfriend Zane so that they would be cured. The pill works, and Tally tries to get everyone to be "bubbly" which means making yourself ugly minded through high adrenaline activities(you can think clearly). The Specials, a group that keeps the pretties pretty-minded so that they do not leave the city and roam the earth, finds out what Tally is doing and tries to stop her. Tally has to run away from the city, not an easy feat, and find the Smokies to tell them that the cure has worked. After she does that, Tally and the Smokies lure people to the outer edges of the city and giving all the pretties pills. Soon enough, everyone is ugly-minded and they combat the Specials. Tally overcomes the struggle of trying to make all the pretties ugly-minded so that they can think for themselves by running away to the smoke, outsmarting the Specials, and by the help of loyal friends. I think that Tally was very brave and courageous to go against the Specials just to save other people while putting her life at risk. What makes this a struggle is that Tally had to endure the cold, starvation, and wilderness while trying to outrun the Specials to find the Smokies. On the other hand, Tally put some of her closest friend's at risk when she asked for Zane and Shay to help her get the pills, find the Smokies, set up decoy's for the Specials, and distribute pills to other pretties. If the Specials would have found out about them helping Tally, they would have had major brain surgery or sent to a type of solitary jail for life, either of which is not very appealing. 

MLA for The Pretties: 

Westerfeld, Scott. The Pretties. Simon Pulse, 2004. (note The Pretties should be underlined but blogger does not let me do that)