Book | Reached by Ally Condie

Reached by Ally Condie
Series: Matched #3
Published By: Penguin
Published On: November 30, 2012
Genre: Dystopian, Romance
Pages: 532
Format: eBook
Rating: 4

After leaving Society to desperately seek The Rising, and each other, Cassia and Ky have found what they were looking for, but at the cost of losing each other yet again. Cassia is assigned undercover in Central city, Ky outside the borders, an airship pilot with Indie. Xander is a medic, with a secret. All too soon, everything shifts again.

Ally Condie’s Matched trilogy comes to a conclusion in the third book of the series, Reached. In Matched we see Cassia matched with both Xander and Ky. In Crossed we follow Cassia’s adventures in her search for Ky and the Rising. Crossed follows the journey of the Rising as they attempt to destroy the Society. After a plague has been introduced into the Society, it is up to the Rising, the only people with a cure, to step in and take over. However, things don’t quite go according to plan.

In general, I really liked this book. I love the details about the Society and the way these people are living. I love the history of both the Rising and the Society itself. These details are what make you realise that a society like that could exist in the future.

I feel for all the characters. I feel the pain and emotion of every one of the characters in Reached. I love all three of the main characters – Cassia, Ky and Xander – and I really enjoyed the introduction of some new characters in Reached, such as Lei, Anna and Oker. Unlike in the second instalment, Crossed, these new additions were developed more, as were those who had been introduced in Crossed, and added to the book. I also have to add, I love Bram!

I loved having the story told from Xander’s point of view. This was always something that I felt had been missing from the first two books so I was so glad to see Xander finally had a voice. I felt that it really added to the story to see things from his point of view as well as Cassia’s and Ky’s.

While much of the medical talk both confused and bored me slightly, the development of the Plague and the problems that arose in regards to it were quite interesting to read. These problems also meant that the story was not at all slow. In fact, I began to wonder what was happening as what appeared to be the main event of the book began very early on.

I was glad to see a lot of the lose ends were tied up in this book. Things that had previously seemed irrelevant in the first two books were proven to be essential to the story. The one disappointment for me, however, was the ending. While most questions had been answered and it appeared as though the ending would round off the trilogy nicely, the ending was abrupt and a little unclear, as if leaving opportunity for another book.

I did thoroughly enjoy Reached, and the trilogy as a whole, but do feel as though the last chapter of the book was missing, as if it needed just that little bit more. However, the last instalment of the trilogy did do a generally good job of answering the questions and ending things relatively nicely.