3.11k reviews for:

Crossed

Ally Condie

3.23 AVERAGE


Oh the writing *.*
all those beautiful poems, all those well-built plot twists and lovely characters.
I had many doubts about the potential this story has, and how it would evolve, but now I don't.
adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
kambriesmith19's profile picture

kambriesmith19's review

3.75
adventurous challenging dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
adventurous emotional medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

This book was such a disappointment! I stuck it out to the end just because I hate giving up on a book, but really, nothing of note happened. The writing was boring, the relationship between Ky and Cassia was boring, the plot was boring... the whole thing was a total bore! Unless the third book gets great reviews, I will not be continuing this series.

H

mrs_syphros's review

3.25
adventurous mysterious sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
adventurous medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

"Crossed, Crossed, mighty crossed,
Do not go gentle into that good night,
When I have crossed the bar.
Across the waves and to the shore,
I climb into the dark for you
Are you waiting in the stars for me?"

-Hayden Casey

Crossed seems to revolve heavily around poetry, so I took every poem in the book and took a line from each and put them all together for you. Well, except for that first line. I made that one up all on my own. Don't you like it?



As was the case in Matched, the writing in Crossed is top-notch, lyrical and beautiful and poetic and delicious. I just want to eat it, like it's a big cake full of poetry, except the poetry is candy because poetry is written on paper and I'm pretty darn sure no one wants to eat paper inside their cake.

Like Matched as well, Crossed has virtually no plot and virtually no conflict, but here's what you need to know, guys: it's okay. It's okay for these books to be running low on the technical stuff. It's almost like this book and Matched are in a genre all on their own. Even though the plot and stuff run dry, the writing quenches your thirst like no other and makes the books worthy of reading.

In Crossed, both Cassia and Ky are outside of the Society, and at the end, the whole book is kind of pointless, but I'm not going to get into too much detail about that; don't want to ruin it for you, but whatevs. The plot is steady for people who are on adventure, but it's still not as quick as I would've liked for it to be. Lots of it was background information, which filled the reader in on the story a little more, and it made Crossed an enjoyable read.

Lots of people have been saying Crossed is the sophomore slump of the Matched trilogy, but I don't agree. In Crossed, the reader is thrust in on this completely different adventure from what we see happening in Matched, which probably threw some people off. I don't think it's any worse quality than Matched (especially not in the writing aspect. In fact, it's even more lyrical and beautiful than I remember), just completely different, and the reader is left going "OMG what just happened?"

Overall, Crossed is much less intense than Matched, which again probably threw some readers off and left them disappointed. In Matched, there was the big prospective question hanging over the readers' head the whole time: Cassia's Match went wrong. Is she going to choose Xander or Ky? In Crossed, there isn't that much of an issue with the love interest. Ky seems more of her main love interest since 1) he is a narrator, and 2) he plays a main role in the book. Xander isn't mentioned that often in Crossed; he kind of takes the back-burner for a while, and Ky steps up to the forefront. I didn't really mind it; I don't like books where the love triangles are completely in the dark and the main character seems to just choose at random in the end. I like when there is foundation for them, and in Crossed, you get that.

Crossed is a thrilling and adventurous sequel to Matched, and it'll leave you waiting for the third book anxiously. I know I can't wait for it!


***


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I actually like these more than I thought, the stories and struggles are simpler which means they make a bit more sense than other YA dystopia things. The characters are not incomprehensibly powerful, but kind of normal citizens dealing with extraordinary circumstances. I like it