Publisher's summary: In Cia's dystopian society it's an honor to be chosen for The Testing. But it’s not enough to pass the Test. Cia will have to survive it.
It’s graduation day for sixteen-year-old Malencia Vale, and the entire Five Lakes Colony (the former Great Lakes) is celebrating. All Cia can think about—hope for—is whether she’ll be chosen for The Testing, a United Commonwealth program that selects the best and brightest new graduates to become possible leaders of the slowly revitalizing post-war civilization. When Cia is chosen, her father finally tells her about his own nightmarish half-memories of The Testing. Armed with his dire warnings (”Cia, trust no one”), she bravely heads off to Tosu City, far away from friends and family, perhaps forever. Danger, romance—and sheer terror—await.
My take: Holy flippin’ crap! This book was downright craziness! I’m having the shakes right now thinking about everything that happened in this book, and I’m having severe separation anxiety because I want
Independent Study (book 2) now! If I were put in “The Testing,” I don’t think I could control my temper one bit; I think I’d probably hemorrhage right then and there and start acting like a raving lunatic. In fact, while reading
The Testing, in one moment I’d feel like I wanted to jump right through the pages and go on a frenzied rampage, and then in the next moment I’d feel the complete opposite and I wanted to curl up in a ball and have an internal freak out.
In the very beginning of the book I wasn’t fully invested in the story, and it took me a few tries to get drawn into the story, as I’d start and stop reading. Which is really weird because it wasn’t very far into the book before the story takes a turn that really sparked my interest and got my full attention. At that point, there is this one particular thing that happens that actually had me leaping from my seat in shock, and I was stuck.
I can’t really talk too much about the characters in
The Testing because I have some really strong feelings about a lot of those characters. This is one of those books that had me changing my original feelings for some of the characters by the stuff that transpires by the end of the story. So, by talking about the characters, I’d be revealing major spoilers, and you know how much I hate to do that! In fact, my feelings for some of the characters were so strong that I’ve gotten into a few heated battles with some blogger friends, particularly Jaime from
Two Chicks on Books.
This is a book I would totally recommend! And if you are struggling with the beginning, don’t let that hold you back because the story’s phenomenal!
