Birthmarked --- Caragh O'Brien

Rating: 5 Stars

Genre: Science Fiction, Dystopia, Young Adult

Pages: 361

Official Summary:

After climate change, on the north shore of Unlake Superior, a dystopiam world is divided between those who live inside the wall, and those, like sixteen-year-old midwife Gaia Stone, who live outside. It's Gaia's job to "advance" a quota of infants from poverty into the walled Enclave, until the noght one agonized mother objects, and Gaia's parents are arrested.

Badly scarred since childhood, Gaia is a strong, resourceful loner who begins to question her society. As Gaia's efforts to save her parents take her within the wall, she herself is arrested and imprisoned.

Fraught with difficult moral choices and rich intricate layers of codes, BIRTHMARKED explores a colorful, cruel, eerily familiar world where one girl can make all the difference, and a real hero makes her own moral code.

Review:

Wow. What a cool book! Very original. It was fun to unravel the plot of the book as I read, but there was twists and turns I didn't see coming! The plot was very conflicting and it really made you think about what would be the best solution to the problem. Bit by bit the author reveals information about our world and what led to the Enclave society.

Gaia is a very likable protagonist. She is vulnerable without being weak or whiny, if that makes sense. She grows throughout the story and is a strong woman in the end. I enjoyed this dynamic character.

I highly recommend this book! It smells awesome :)