For A While

I remember when you kissed me

You said you had been wanting to do that

For a while

I wonder if that’s how you felt

When you left me

Unwind

I stumbled upon this book one evening when I received a notification that one of the people I was subscribed to on YouTube had uploaded a new video. It was a short film inspired by a chapter from this novel I’ve never heard of: Unwind by Neal Shusterman. I gave it a look and was instantly hooked (HA! That rhymed!). Watch it here.

We live in an era where dystopian books rule the bookshelves, a fact exemplified by the commercial successes of The Hunger Games to Matched to the Divergent trilogies. Though Unwind falls under the same genre of literature, it takes a more gruesome, horrifying twist in society. If you’ve watched the video until the very end (which I sincerely hope you did), you may still be haunted by how eerie it was. You’d know what I mean.

Setting: Set about fifty years from now, a civil war over abortion had taken place. The conflict, however, was quelled when a scientist suddenly found a way to harvest every part of the human body, which he won a Nobel Prize for. Both sides of the war agreed over the logic that though you’d stop living after being harvested, you wouldn’t actually die as you would live through the people, who will have received your body parts.

It’s about three teenagers, Connor, Risa, and Lev, (16, 15, and 13 respectively) who live in a twisted world where it is acceptable in society for parents to hand over their kids, aged 13-18, to the government to have their body parts harvested for later use. It’s a story of survival as they struggle to hide from society and stay in one piece until they each turn 18.

With the milieu in mind, it’s easy to understand why it’s classified in the “Horror” section of the bookstores.

The main reason why I love this book so much is because it has the perfect amount of adventure to keep it exciting, but not too action-packed that it’s trying too hard. Neal Shusterman created such a vivid, believable horrifying world, that makes you wonder what would happen if it actually came true. The scary part is that with all the current technological advances, the idea becomes rather feasible in the near future.

Plus, there’s also a cute love story for Connor and Risa too. (BONUS POINTS!)

As I have no patience (or cash) to go to a bookstore, I once again read it online as a pdf. If you share the same predicament, you may read it here: http://tinyurl.com/cvq7hp3 (I promise it’s not a virus!)

I apologize for my lack of blogging! I’ve been rather busy with school and what-not. However, don’t be discouraged by my lack of posts as I read every single comment (which totally make my day, by the way!). Rest assured, I have a lot of good stuff that I’ll be sharing with you soon! Thank you for all your support! 🙂 x