From the Bookshelf of Nothing But Reading Challenges…

Uglies (Uglies, #1)

Scott Westerfeld

Start date: August 12, 2015

Finish date: August 31, 2015

Discussion: Books of the Month

Why we're reading this: Young Adult BOM. Click here to get to the discussion…more
[close] Young Adult BOM. Click here to get to the discussion

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 164 topics — 23,390 comments total

Books of the Month

* The Names by Florence Knapp - Sep 25 Adult / Non-Fiction BOM (starts 16 Sep)
By Moderators of… , Challenger-in-Chief · 17 posts · 94 views

last updated Sep 20, 2025 02:35AM

* The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese - Sep 25 Theme BOM - South and South East Asia (Starts 5 September)
By Moderators of… , Challenger-in-Chief · 43 posts · 78 views

last updated 17 hours, 43 min ago

showing 10 of 179 topics view all »

What Members Thought

Sep 29, 2008 Michael rated it really liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, read-in-2008

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. At an unspecificied time in the future everyone turning sixteen is given surgery to become "pretty." Tally Youngblood is young woman, counting down the days to the procdure which despite being extremely intensive is considered worth it for a life of luxury and decadence among her peers. She's waiting to be reunited with her best friend and enjoy the life of being pretty together.

That is until she meets Shay. The two bond over having lost all their friends to the surgery and waiting to join them. At an unspecificied time in the future everyone turning sixteen is given surgery to become "pretty." Tally Youngblood is young woman, counting down the days to the procdure which despite being extremely intensive is considered worth it for a life of luxury and decadence among her peers. She's waiting to be reunited with her best friend and enjoy the life of being pretty together.

That is until she meets Shay. The two bond over having lost all their friends to the surgery and waiting to join them. They sneak out of the city to the wasteland and Tally discovers that not only does Shay not consider herself "ugly" but she has no intention of having the surgerys. Instead she wants to run off with a mysterious boy named David to a secret group of insurgents who refuse to have the surgery. She invites Tally to come with her, but Tally refuses.

Shay runs away, leaving details on how Tally can find the group if she desires. On the day of her surgery, Tally is taken aside by Special Circumstances and told unless she finds Shay and betrays her to them, she (Tally) will be ugly for life. Tally agrees and sets out on her quest to find the rebels.

If that were all the story was, it might just be merely interesting. And though the story does follow a fairly predictable character arc for Tally (she finds the group, fits in better than Shay and decides to stay), the secret behind the surgery that Scott Westerfield reveals mid-way through the novel is far more fascinating. And it also goes a long way to explaining some of the behavoir by post-surgery characters in the novel.

Tally finds out that the surgery creates a specific kind of brain damage among all receipients. This twist explains why certain characters are so vapid and hedonistic in the story. Not only are the people being made to all be the same externally, they're being made to think the same way, to no longer question anything and to live only for the pleasure of the moment. The process is reversible (theoretically) and all of these various storylines lead to one massive cliffhanger that had me curious to see where things go next. ...more

42 likes · Like · see review

Mar 20, 2011 Trisha rated it really liked it

This was better than I thought it would be but I don't intend to keep reading the series. Although the premise is good, there just wasn't really anything that caught me. It wasn't the love (or the love triangle) or the idea of Peris....all pretty and perfect...

An original idea, though, and well thought out. ...more

3 likes · Like · see review

Dec 11, 2008 Amber rated it it was ok

Shelves: ya

No one of my favorite YA books but wasn't bad either. The whole premise of the book is living in a world where everyone is given an operation when they reach 16 that reshapes their bodies so they are "pretty". Which is basically everyone looks similar and everything is perfect. Basically it is plastic surgery over your whole body. Once pretty they do nothing but have fun. Our world as we know it- cars, writing by hand,etc- has been done away with.
Don't expect this to be a fast paced book. A quic ...more

Like · see review

Sep 22, 2008 Karen (EarthAngel2911) rated it really liked it

Shelves: young-adult, cyber-book-club-selections, futuristic-dystopian-utopian-societ, library-reads

Just the first line of this book made me want to continue reading to see what would come next.

It seems to be set far into the future where humans have learned to co-exist with Earth without harm to the environment. The interesting thing is that after people are "littlies" they have four years, from age 12 - 15, where they are "ugly."

The suffer through these four years, knowing that once they turn 16, they will have an operation that will transform them into someone so beautiful, that people will ...more

Like · see review

Oct 07, 2011 Michelle rated it really liked it

Shelves: dystopian

I enjoyed the Uglies very much. It was well written. It flowed well. Loved the main character, Tally. She's just a girl that did what she had to do. She was strong and did what she thought was right. Just an all around good read. ...more

Like · see review

Jan 01, 2010 Laura rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2010s

I first got interested due to the fact that other students in my school was reading this. Tally is an ugly and she wants to be pretty but thanks to Shay... she can't til she brings Shay back. Kinda makes me wanna be pretty now except I rather not be a bubblehead. ...more

Like · see review