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    Specials
    Specials
    Specials
    Audiobook9 hours

    Specials

    Written by Scott Westerfeld

    Narrated by Emily Tremaine

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    The third installment of Scott Westerfeld’s New York Times bestselling and award-winning Uglies series—a global phenomenon that started the dystopian trend.

    Tally thought they were a rumor, but now she’s one of them. A Special. A super-amped fighting machine, engineered to keep the uglies down and the pretties stupid.

    But maybe being perfectly programmed with strength and focus isn’t better than anything she’s ever known. Tally still has memories of something else.

    Still, it’s easy to tune that out—until she’s offered a chance to stamp out the rebels of the New Smoke permanently. It all comes down to one last choice: listen to that tiny, faint heartbeat, or carry out the mission she’s programmed to complete. Either way, Tally’s world will never be the same.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Audio
    Release dateAug 25, 2015
    ISBN9781442393981
    Author

    Scott Westerfeld

    Scott Westerfeld is the author of ten books for young adults, including Peeps, The Last Days, and the Midnighters trilogy. He was born in Texas in 1963, is married to the Hugo-nominated writer Justine Larbalestier, and splits his time between New York and Sydney. His latest book is Extras, the fourth in the bestselling Uglies series.

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    Reviews for Specials

    4/5

    2,477 ratings132 reviews

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    • 4/5
      A well told adventure set in a future where the populace is contained in idyllic enclaves devoted to a luxuriant yet regimented lifestyle. This becomes a somewhat typical story of how the heroine learns more about the secrets behind those cities and how they work to subvert them. However, the story never lags and the use of cosmetic surgery to produce perfect faces and bodies (based on human evolution) adds a unique touch. Recommended if you enjoyed the Hunger Games (though it was written prior to that series).
    • 3/5
      ok. so on top of all the other stuff i have been reading lately, i became thoroughly engrossed in a series which has not let me down in the slightest. this is a bit long winded, but keep in mind it is in reference to reading three books.. and i am trying REALLY hard not to give away spoilers..

      it is hard to write about this book because in the context of the review, the keywords and mannerisms of the characters society seems like nothing but grammar and spelling errors. bear with it though, in the books, you are so washed over with the word use and logic that it actually makes sense in the proper frame.

      the Uglies trilogy (now a quadrilogy?) was very engrossing. Book one, Uglies, describes a world where there is no war. there is no famine, hatred, or turmoil. 200-300 years in the past over population, strip mining, clear cutting, genetic engineering of plants and animals laid waste on everything in the world. humans have rebuilt from the ashes after we destroyed ourselves. our generation is referred to as “the rusties” since everything left from our world is covered in rust and falling apart.

      Tally Youngblood is 15 years old, and only months away from becoming one of the “pretties”. in this world, to remove all of the dangerous human habits of destruction, you are born and raised by your parents, once you hit a certain age (8 or 9 from what i could tell) you are shipped off to school as an ugly. at the age of 16 you are taken from school where you will be put under the knife and remade as a better person. your bones are ground down and or elongated, you have new muscle tissue added to your body, and you have full facial re-constructive surgery. all “pretties” have a choice on how they look, with in the guidelines of the governments rules of morphology. they effectively remove all extremes in height, hair color, skin color, etc. everyone is similar and there is no need for hatred.

      Tally, in waiting for her 16th birthday meets a new friend, Shay, who has no desire to become one of the pretties. a week before their shared birthday/graduation from being uglies, Shay decides to run off to a rumored group of rebels who have shafted the system and stayed ugly, and foregone all efforts to work within the system. Tally however has no desire to join her friend and sticks around for her surge (surgery). her only desire is become pretty and join her friends in New Pretty town, where she can dance and play and enjoy the life she has been programmed to want since birth.

      Unfortunately, Tally is roped into a game of social change. she is scooped up by the fearsome and dangerous police force that acts as bogeymen for the government. Special Circumstances (the Specials) only comes forward when needed, generally letting the local police force take care of everything. This being a “Special circumstance” Tally is forced to follow her friend to the encampment of rebels (the Smoke) and betray her friend, and everyone who has escaped so far. if she does not, she will be denies surge and will forever be Ugly. and in this society, this is the worst thing that could ever happen to you.

      Book one was so good, that i had an itch to move on to book two immediately. i hate doing that. i love to stretch a series out if possible, and draw out the enjoyment from the story line. so when book one was finished, though i really wanted to move on to the second book, i ramped myself down and read the Real Ultimate Power: The Official Ninja book. Book two immediately followed and when finished i lost all self control and my fingers and eyes forced me to read book three next.. it took about two days with my schedule.. two lousy days.. why couldn’t it last longer… i wasted a great book by reading it too soon..

      well, not a waste. damn. it was so good, i had no choice really.. it was in my best interest to read the book. or so i keep telling myself. there is a fourth book. it was written after the trilogy was announced, so it is a bit of an anomaly, thus the trilogy quadrilogy notation above. unfortunately, the book Extras is still in hardback edition, so until it hits paperback, i will have to force myself to wait.. this sucks..

      these books, written by Scott Westerfeld, fall into the teen-fiction category. they are written for teens, but the story line and books themselves do not lend themselves only to teens. being thirty years old, i literally could not stop reading these books. if you need a good break from your normal reading schedule, i would throw these in the mix and read them. they all rank around 300 pages of single space small print, so they are not some little read you would use to sturdy the kitchen table. instead, they are full of vibrant ideas, technology, tattoos that i wish were a reality. there were no obvious plot twists that made me think “why am i reading this” or “how predictable” instead, i was often surprised and left feeling “bubbly” as they state in the book.

      imagine a world full of barbie dolls being slowly destroyed by barbie’s cyber-punk kid sister that has been kept in the closet for years.

      i was sad to come to the end of this series, but glad to know that i will have at least one more book to close it all up in the near future.

      anyone who is interested should note that all three of the first books can be bought in a boxed set for under 20 bucks.. this is how i got sucked into them.. a really good price for a nice story line idea turned into one of the best purchases i have made on books in a while. now, i just have to hope that hollywood has not gotten their hands on the thought of movies. these would be thoroughly ruined and not done justice.. read them before someone fucks them up for you… thats all i have to say on the matter.
    • 3/5
      The final volume of the Uglies trilogy, it had a lot of plot threads and philosophies to tie together. I was surprised and pleased at how effectively Westerfeld turned the revolution on its head.
    • 3/5
      3.5 stars

      Better than Pretties, but not as good as Uglies. I didn't like how each book in the trilogy followed the exact same plot. And the ending to the love triangle seemed, flat.

      I got my hopes up for this series and while it was enjoyable, I don't really understand the hype.
    • 4/5
      The first part of this book as hard to get into. When the main character keeps changing so drastically sometimes it's hard to keep that invested relationship you have with her/him. But after a few chapters Tally starts to peek through again. Still she's much harder to relate to in this volume. I believe this is an ending to the series, and as such the book did a fairly good job of tying up loose ends and concluding. There's more to the series than just a entertaining read. There are some thought provoking ideas mixed up in it as well, and I give Westerfeld high props for that. I'm glad I finally got to this series.
    • 3/5
      Tally is wayyy too annoying in this Istg-.. The book was fine though
    • 5/5
      ? perfect book for teenagers and people who just started learning English
    • 2/5
      "Uglies" was really the standard-bearer for me. This wasn't as compelling.

      Tally and best friend Shay are Specials, beautiful girls with a sharp
      edge and superhuman abilities. A caper to steal a cutter tool from the
      Armory results in the two completely destroying the Armory in order to
      escape detection. The consequence is an attack by New Pretty Town on Diego, the town they suspect of attacking the Armory and current hotbed of runaways seeking freedom and a cure from their limited social statuses as Pretties, Ugies, etc.
    • 3/5
      It was just ok. Not my fav of the series
    • 5/5
      I am enjoying this series. Tally is growing so much as a character. I was so happy to see more of Shay. I cannot wait to read the next book.
    • 2/5
      I did not enjoy the 3rdbook as much as the first two.
    • 5/5
      Good!! But I think I liked Uglies the best. :/
    • 5/5
      Excitement from beginning to end! I think this was better than the 1st two!
    • 4/5
      After the disappointment of Pretties, I was surprised to discover that Specials, in a sense, redeems the trilogy. The characters are presented in a far more complex, three-dimensional, manner. Their world becomes more complex too. In fact my main complaint in Pretties was the presentation of some characters as pure evil or pure good. Here characters are shown to be capable of both good and evil, and it is sometimes their choices that impacts which way they behave, but other times it is circumstances beyond their control. While I wish the trilogy was stronger in Pretties, Specials redeems it enough to make it a worthy read.
    • 3/5
      Good ending of trilogy.
    • 2/5
      I do enjoy the story told in this series but I wasnt as fond of this book. I thought the treatment of what is essentially the only disabled character in the series to be appalling (intentional or not) and felt like the focus of what was important should have been more on the societal issues than the environmental ones.

      Personal note, there is a lot of self harm happening in this book and I found it pretty triggering.
    • 2/5
      teen science fiction/dystopia. 3rd in the "Uglies" series, each installment functions as its own separate story (no need to read them all, or in order), set in the 2300s after the "Rusties" (a.k.a. 21st century culture, a.k.a. us) have apparently warred themselves and the environment to death. I found the world-building to be lacking, the limited vernacular to be overused to the point of banality, the characters not-so-compelling, and the whole set-up remniscent of the unkindest parts of high school. I think I much prefer the action/airship series "Leviathon," and probably would not even have finished this one had it not been a quick read that satisfies a requirement for our teen summer reading program (2 books down, three to go).
    • 5/5
      I would highly recommend this series (4 in all) to anyone who likes a little bit of sci-fi every once in awhile, especially the type that is a couple of hundred years in the future and shows how mankind could possibly turn out. All three books I have read so far are very thought provoking, exciting, and keep you on the edge of your seat throughout. I have read each one of these books in about a day.
    • 4/5
      I wasn't sure how I felt about this whole series, but I'm pleased with this third book, and with the ending. It seems right. Looking forward to reading Extras.
    • 4/5
      If you loose everything and become the thing that everyone fears, are you capable of relearning what it means to be you, and will those who once one your side be patient enough to forget the worse that you've become.
    • 2/5
      On the reread, I liked this book better than the one that came before it. This may be due to improvements such as – less time devoted to camping in the woods, and not just rehashing the first book.

      It still didn't match up to my fond memories of it.

      Overall, I don't think the plot of the entire trilogy made much sense. It all hinges on some connection between brain structure and chemistry that I don't think Westerfeld properly worked out himself. On the one hand, Tally can "think her way out of" being a bubbleheaded pretty, and the same with being a special; but on the other hand, some mysterious chemical "cure" changes people's brain chemistry such that they break with the habits of a lifetime (or at least the part since their pretty operations)... and stage an entire continent-wide revolution.

      The "cure" is explained even less well than in the last book, too; at least that time there was something about "lesions" making people bubbleheaded, that "nanos" can eat to cure the affliction. Okay. But then in this book, we learn that Tally's experience of thinking her way out of bubbleheadedness has inspired Maddy to change her cure design. So what does it even do now?! If Maddy's been inspired to let people think their way out of their brain configuration, that makes it sound like her new "cure" is just a placebo. But it's clearly not, because countless specials receive a cure against their will that changes the way they think... against their will.

      So, I really don't understand what we were meant to take away about brain structures and personality and so on there. It just seemed inconsistent and considering it's what the entire plot revolves around...

      There were other plot holes, too. For instance, I do not believe that the Crims would be recruited to this elite, secretive force known as Special Circumstances and never seem to be under any kind of supervision of any kind, ever. They're just free agents doing their own thing, and "their own thing" turns out to involve destroying the city's armoury in a massive chemical disaster. Seriously? Dr Cable didn't think to monitor her pet projects a little better? Considering the way the trilogy depicts her as this master manipulator who's always three steps ahead of everyone else, this is perplexing.

      And her demise, as I suggested, is pathetic.

      Then the book seems very muddled in the message it's trying to send about human nature. The book specifically declares that human nature is to be selfish, and it suggests that human nature is to pursue endless growth until the destruction of the world. "Rusty civilisation" (our civilisation) serves as a warning throughout the series of the dangers of endless, unsustainable growth, but then in this book it seems that the first thing humanity does when in possession of their own minds is resort to environmental destruction. Which is why the last two pages is about how Tally and David are going to become the "new special circumstances", and try to stop that. But again... seriously? Two people are going to single-handedly save the environment of an entire continent? Sure, that is so believable.

      And as well, it ends up giving the impression that the very regime Tally just overthrew had the right idea – human nature is to slowly commit mass suicide, so you'd better keep them pacified for their own good. I think when I first read the series, I loved the apparent moral dilemma. Now, I'm not so sure.

      Another seeming contradiction that crops up is the glorification of cutting, after the first book spent so much time preaching about how horrible all our modern stress over body image is. Like... I don't understand why you would preach and preach about body image and how everyone should feel comfortable in their own skins, but then glorify cutting. They just seem like two sides of the same coin (or two sides of the same dice... I'm sure there are lots of similar issues), and considering this trilogy seems to aspire to impart a moral lesson to pre-teen, or perhaps young teenage readers, it doesn't seem very good at it.

      In the end, I am really undecided as to whether to give this two stars or three. I did like this book better than the previous one (which I rated two), mostly for reasons of pace and structure, which were much improved. But then the plot made a lot less sense, so ratings-wise I think that evens out. It's a reasonably fun read, just kind of nonsensical.

      I'm still planning to read the "bonus" book, Extras, at some point in the near future; I didn't actually read that one when it first came out so it'll be something new, at least! And hopefully an improvement, although, maybe I won't expect too much from it.
    • 5/5
      Specials is the third book in Scott Westerfeld's Uglies trilogy. In this book, Tally and her best friend, Shay, have been transformed into Specials and made a new division of Special Circumstances called Cutters. This is a task force intended to hunt down and eradicate the New Smoke - their former friends. But try as she might, Tally can't completely get rid of her fondness and love for the people in New Smoke or their cause. So she is left to decide: embrace her new life as a Special and kill the New Smoke people or find away to take down the regime in charge of her City and start a new way of life for everybody.


      I keep expecting the novelty of these books to wear off but it never does. These books are well written, fast paced and intriguing. Tally is a girl that is easy to identify with and to want to be. I had seen these books around the bookstores for a long time and thought they looked good but I never made that leap to picking them up and reading them. Thanks to the Books on the Nighstand reading challenge and the Bart's Bookshelf reading challenge for giving me the incentive to finally pick them up and read them. I'm glad I did.
    • 3/5
      Still good, but not as exciting as the first book.
    • 4/5
      Me at every YA protagonist ever:

      "I thought if you could see the world clearly, you'd think about yourself a little less. It wouldn't just be you and your latest boyfriend; I thought you might let something else matter every once in a while."

      The Writing and Worldbuilding

      The world really expanded in this one, and even gave me a clearer geographic idea of where the previous books took place. I'm guessing Tally's city is in Oregon or Washington, and that makes me happy because yay! A local!

      I liked how the cliches of this series were actually questioned, like Tally's selfishness, and how she's constantly being caught and upgraded.

      "I'm not sure what I am anymore, Zane. Sometimes I think I'm nothing but what other people have done to me—a big collection of brainwashing, surgeries, and cures."
      Overall, I liked this book, but I wasn't really on the edge of my seat the whole time; I wasn't bored either though, as Westerfeld's writing style is very easy and quick, and the action was fast and well-paced.

      The Characters

      Tally: My sister warned me last book about Pretty Tally, but honestly Special Tally was more annoying, going on borderline-Speshul Tally.

      Shay: I like how Shay continued to call out Tally on all her BS. It was really needed.

      Zane and David: There really wasn't as much of a love triangle element in this as there was in the last book (I mean, technically there was, but it wasn't as obvious or important) and so these guys were pretty okay.

      Conclusion

      Honestly, writing this review, I feel like there's not much to say about this book. It was good, and I liked it more in some ways than the others, but I just don't have much to say for some reason. Any way, I'm glad that Westerfeld wrote Extras and is going to write three more books set in the Uglies world, starting with Imposters, because I really like the world and I'm excited to delve deeper into it, hopefully with less Speshul Tally and more new characters.
    • 4/5
      Ok, so I was half asleep during the first part of this audiobook, but I just finished it off this morning while working on something. It was sometimes predictable, and I can be bad at spotting predictable, but the adventures of Tally are just fun. I was sad to see her hoverboard off into the sunset...
    • 3/5
      I kinda started losing interest in the series a bit with this one. It just started stretching things a bit too much, especially considering it wasn't really my kind of series to start with (which says a lot about the fact I continued reading to this point). That said, I will be reading the next one shortly, and am glad that the announcement regarding the new books put these books back on my radar at a time that I was able to give them a real chance with access to the audiobooks and all, which I didn't have back when the series was first released. It's definitely still worth reading, and is an interesting continuation of the storyline.
    • 5/5
      This novel was riveting. I was blown-away. I was horrified by the ending of the prior novel and wondering exactly how Tally would climb out of this mess. I actually was surprised with how she embraced everything. Shay pissed me off, but she had her merits. Zane's role was to tug at Tally's heart strings and rewire her brain. David stepped back into the novel in a way that most pleased me. I was not disappointed.

      The whole thing has just left me speechless. I have the same scrubbed out feeling that I get when I read a really life-changing novel. So Specials has its shock factor--its wow. Way, and I mean, way better than the first novels. We don't have all the annoying pretty speech.

      Just a few things, because of the cutting, I would not recommend this to children under 16.

      And the manifesto at the end was just stupid. Not the best new course for Tally. Lame. Totally brain-disappointing.

      What had me screaming was just how out of control Tally's life really was, and all through the whole thing, she fought for control. That's what made this novel awesome. Tally changed and persevered through every trial.

      And Dr Cable still was always one step ahead.

      Brilliant.
    • 3/5
      A good finish to a great series.
    • 4/5
      Looking around I think I may be in the minority in thinking that this may be the best of the trilogy. I really enjoyed Uglies and, overall, it's probably a more consistent book, but the ending for Specials is very different from what I thought would come from the series. It's hard to describe (without spoiling anything) other than to say that it isn't exactly happy, but it was immensely satisfying.

      A big improvement for me over Pretties, which felt too much like a rehash of Uglies.
    • 5/5
      I am almost scared to read book four, simply because the series could have been complete with this book. Everything ended, not perfectly of course, but as perfect as a series of this sort could end. In fact, the last words of the novel gave me goosebumps. I really appreciated the social commentary and how this series brings some awareness into the lives of people reading it. I especially like the way cutting was brought to light. Other than the more serious sides I was able to bring away from the book, I was very intrigued at how the situation played out with the "villain" in the end. That was a twist I did not see coming and was so different than any dystopian series I've read so far. If you're a fan of dystopia or a fan of Westerfeld you must read this series.