This is a young adult dystopian novel. The heroine is a young woman named Cia. We meet her on the day of her graduation from high school. She is subsequently chosen for something called "the Testing", which is basically entry to further education and leadership opportunities. She is thrilled until she starts to learn some sinister things about the process. Then she is actually taken to begin the Testing. Other candidates die, some right in front of her. The final part of the Testing is a huge ordeal (weeks long), and even more people die. The ending of the book appears to be set to go straight into the second of three planned novels.
A lot of comparisons to books like The Hunger Games have been made. There are some similarities, definitely. However, this book was well written. The characters are well fleshed out. It wasn't predictable, other than some events that seemed unavoidable. I look forward to reading the next book in the series. If you have a young reader that has problems with violence, you may want to preview this book first.
Reviewer: Lorien Goodale
Available: June 4, 2013
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