This is a review for the entire series, “The Selection.” Yes, I’ve reviewed other books in the series, but I thought the whole series needed its own review.
I can’t imagine why someone would buy a book based on the picture on the cover alone, but apparently, after reading several reviews from Amazon, quite a few people have done just that, and yet each of them seems to complain that the contents inside the book were nothing like the picture itself on the cover.
I, however, read what the book would be about before buying this book, and I also read about 40 of the reviews, which after reading the book, I think most were really unfair.
If you can get past the parts of the book which were obvious and blatant rip-offs of The Hunger Games and the names of the characters in the book, which apparently many people found annoying, then at its heart, you have a good story.
A young girl named America Singer secretly is in love with a boy named Aspen. Well, I’m getting rather ahead of myself. Let me start from the beginning.
The book takes place in the future United States of America after the 4th world war. America is no longer named America; it is now the country of Illea and is run by a royal family. Society as a whole is broken down into an 8-tier caste or ranking system. Your family’s original level or rank was based on their ability to help the newly forming government at the time. Then, every generation would inherit their station in life based on their original assigned caste or rank. Rank 1 is the royal family. Rank 8 is … well, they are the lowest forms of life, the homeless, mentally ill, criminals, and whatnot. Rank 6 would be servants, while rank five would be the artists of the world, including musicians, artists, and other basic skilled laborers.
Rank 4 seemed to be factory workers, while rank 3 were things like teachers.
Rank 2, we would later learn in the book, is the well-to-do, including models and other members of society awarded such a station by the royal family, including retired veterans of the Illea army who get drafted at 19 and must serve ten years of their life. No matter their rank at the time of enlistment (even if they are an 8), they get to be a two at the end of their service. That seems a little off to me. I mean, a clear and obvious setup for the main character, who will also be awarded rank 2 for being a part of “The Selection.”
The lower your rank, the poorer you were. Rank 5’s struggled but could at least afford to eat, whereas rank 6’s might not always have food to put on the table.
As I said before, the country is run by a royal family. Any daughters born to the royal family are married off to princes and dignitaries from other counties to secure stronger relations. The boys, however, would marry the “daughters of Illea.” What this means is that when a prince comes of age, 1 girl from each district or region, as they call them, is selected to compete in a bachelor-style competition. The winner gets to marry the prince and enjoy all that life as a royal family member has to offer. Their entire family is then uplifted to a 2.
All of the competing members of the selected 35 are automatically awarded the rank three but not their families. Their families will only get a rise in rank if their daughter wins. While the 35 are competing, their families are given some sort of financial compensation. The longer the girl stays in the competition, the more money the family would receive.
America Singer is the main focus of this story, whose family is a rank 5. At the first of the book, she is in love with a boy named Aspen, who is a rank 6. America’s family wants the best for her and hopes she will marry as her older sister did. Her sister married a 4. Later in the story, you learn that America has an older brother, who, although born a 5, is an unusually gifted sculptor and becoming rather famous in his own right. He dreams of making enough money to one day be a rank 2. In pursuing his dreams of fame and fortune, he does his family kind of wrong in the process; as a result, they haven’t really been close with him since.
Besides him, though, America is very close with the rest of her family. They struggle as any lower-middle-class family would, but in the end, the love between them all is very evident, and it is her love and devotion for her family that drives her to try and stay in the competition for as long as she can so that her family will continue to get the money from the royal family.
America Singer has fallen in love with a boy whose family is much worse off than she is. They are ranked 6, and more often than not, they can’t afford to feed themselves, so America saves her dinner scraps and feeds them to Aspen when he comes for a secret visit.
Aspen wants America to try and compete for a place in The Selection because he wants more for her than he knows he could ever give her.
America agrees to compete, confident she won’t get selected in the first place, but she does, and that is where the trouble begins.
The story follows America Singer and the events that take place in “The Selection.” The story ends at the finals of sorts, where they pick the top 10, which they call “The Elite, ” which is the setup for the second book in the series.
Is the story good? Yes. It’s not really that bad. While not the best book was ever written, not every book can be Twilight. Is it worth the read? If you are a fan of romance novels in the young adult genre, then this book is probably worth your time.
The Selection is now available on Amazon
The Elite is book 2 in the series
The One is book 3 in the series
