- Paperback: 432 pages
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's (4 Feb 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 184738126X
- ISBN-13: 978-1847381262
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.4 x 3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 183,951 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Extras (Uglies Quartet)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
At the end of Specials, the conclusion to the Uglies trilogy, things in Tally's futuristic world had stabilised. The walls between the social classes - the uglies, pretties and specials - had been torn down. So Tally took off to live on her own in the wild. Fast forward...Tally discovers another brand new world. In Extras, it's all about who you know, and how much you have. It's just like LA. Only Paris and Nicole are way dead...
About the Author
Scott Westerfeld is the author of five adult novels. He has written two books in the MIDNIGHTERS trilogy for teens, as well as SO YESTERDAY. He divides his time between Sydney and New York. Visit his website - www.scottwesterfeld.com
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I was a little reticent about picking up 'Extras', having found 'Specials' the third instalment of the 'Uglies Trilogy' the weakest of the the three. This combined with the fact the trilogy was now suddenly billed as a quartet, did not bode well. It may have worked for Douglas Adams but as a general rule, revisiting a completed series, produces novels that are shadows of the original stories. Not so in this case.
There is a a very strong argument for Extras being the best of the four. It has the same easy to read style and I found the story more coherent than in the previous novels. It seemed to me, now that Westerfeld has had a few years to kick about in his future world, he feels a lot more at home there.
In Extras, it's our obsession with fame that comes under the microscope; the central characters live in a city where your fame ranking determines everything about you. It's a fantastic metaphor for twenty first century culture. Journalism also comes under the microscope and Westerfeld explores the power of honesty and'Truth-Slanting', the idea that there are multiple ways to spin a story.
Like the previous novels in the series, Extras is a terrific read. Westerfeld writes exciting stories, using shades of grey that should provoke the reader into thinking a little more about the world we live in. I think he is a sadly underrated author, if Westerfeld lived inside his own creation, he'd barely exist and that would be a crying shame.
There is a a very strong argument for Extras being the best of the four. It has the same easy to read style and I found the story more coherent than in the previous novels. It seemed to me, now that Westerfeld has had a few years to kick about in his future world, he feels a lot more at home there.
In Extras, it's our obsession with fame that comes under the microscope; the central characters live in a city where your fame ranking determines everything about you. It's a fantastic metaphor for twenty first century culture. Journalism also comes under the microscope and Westerfeld explores the power of honesty and'Truth-Slanting', the idea that there are multiple ways to spin a story.
Like the previous novels in the series, Extras is a terrific read. Westerfeld writes exciting stories, using shades of grey that should provoke the reader into thinking a little more about the world we live in. I think he is a sadly underrated author, if Westerfeld lived inside his own creation, he'd barely exist and that would be a crying shame.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is the fourth novel set in the same universe as the Uglies series. I suppose technically it's the fourth book in the series, but as it has an entirely different antagonist, it feels like it is separate. In the previous series, people are given a surgery at the age of 16 that changes them from "uglies" to "pretties," yet it changed their minds and turned them into "bubbleheads." Now, that regime has ended.
Aya Fuse lives in a city in Japan where people are rediscovering their culture (tea ceremonies, manga) but where fame is of the utmost importance. Everyone has a face rank, and their goal is to have the highest face rank possible. They move up and down in rank by "kicking" stories onto their "feed." Aya's face rank is low--around 450,000. Her older brother is an intelligent "techhead" at has recently hit the top 1,000, and Aya is burning with jealousy and anger at being an "extra." One day, Aya Fuse meets the Sly Girls, a group of girls who pull stunts and try to have the lowest face rank possible. Aya decides that it would be an amazing story and goes undercover to spy on them. Aya ends up uncovering a story much bigger than she initially thought she would.
It's different from the first three books (Uglies, Pretties, and Specials), but it's an excellent book in its own respect. As a blogger and reviewer, much resonated with me. I'm pretty far down in the "face ranks" of Amazon and Livejournal, whereas some inane blogger with a pretty face blogging about what dress she should wear that day would rank near the top. Yet this book made me chuckle at how silly such a pursuit fame ultimately is. Aya seemed so silly to bring her hovercam everywhere...but how different am I, taking a camera with me most places, to record what I did that day? I love young adult books that actually push decent morals. The Uglies series are books that are quickly read, but they would make an excellent gift for young adult and "grown-ups" alike.
Aya Fuse lives in a city in Japan where people are rediscovering their culture (tea ceremonies, manga) but where fame is of the utmost importance. Everyone has a face rank, and their goal is to have the highest face rank possible. They move up and down in rank by "kicking" stories onto their "feed." Aya's face rank is low--around 450,000. Her older brother is an intelligent "techhead" at has recently hit the top 1,000, and Aya is burning with jealousy and anger at being an "extra." One day, Aya Fuse meets the Sly Girls, a group of girls who pull stunts and try to have the lowest face rank possible. Aya decides that it would be an amazing story and goes undercover to spy on them. Aya ends up uncovering a story much bigger than she initially thought she would.
It's different from the first three books (Uglies, Pretties, and Specials), but it's an excellent book in its own respect. As a blogger and reviewer, much resonated with me. I'm pretty far down in the "face ranks" of Amazon and Livejournal, whereas some inane blogger with a pretty face blogging about what dress she should wear that day would rank near the top. Yet this book made me chuckle at how silly such a pursuit fame ultimately is. Aya seemed so silly to bring her hovercam everywhere...but how different am I, taking a camera with me most places, to record what I did that day? I love young adult books that actually push decent morals. The Uglies series are books that are quickly read, but they would make an excellent gift for young adult and "grown-ups" alike.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This, the fourth book in the Uglies trilogy, is in some ways better than the original series, as it provides a fresh viewpoint and new characters to look at the Pretties world after Tally Youngblood's radical revolution.
Aya is a 15 year old in a Japanese city, a city which has re-organized its economy around the idea of fame, or face-rank as called here. As a near faceless extra, with a face rank down in the 400,000's, Aya is driven to find a news story that will propel her to fame as one of the best 'kickers' (equivalent to an investigative journalist) around. Accidentally observing a shadowy clique known as the Sly Girls, who for reasons of their own actively avoid fame, doing something both dangerous and fun, she decides that doing a story about this group will be a decidedly great way to help her in her quest to become something other than a nonentity. But the story of the Sly Girls leads her to a much larger story, one with potentially deadly consequences for the entire world, and one which will eventually attract the attention of the person with the #1 face-rank, Tally Youngblood, while at the same time involve Aya in the moral and ethical quandaries that journalism sometimes leads to.
The plot line is good, leading to some very unexpected corners of the world, and Aya is well drawn. The new society portrayed here makes an interesting contrast to that of the mind-hobbled Pretties, as without those mental limitations this new world shows a vibrancy of many different people heading off in all directions, from tech geek-hood to obsessive gossip-generating stunts. There's even some sly satire about things like how some people try to improve their Google rank today with a group in Aya's world who try to artificially boost someone's face rank by mentioned that person's name again and again.
The above is all good, but I found a few things that nagged. There are some technical bobbles, which are difficult to detail without giving away the plot, but I'll give one example. When you accelerate a multi-ton piece of steel to orbital escape velocity in an air-evacuated tunnel, then launch it up into the air, the result will be a very loud bang, hearable for miles around, and this thunder will continue following the projectile for a very long way. This is not good if you are trying to conceal the launch of such a projectile, especially if you are launching hundreds of these objects. There are some plausibility issues with the methods and aims of what turns out to be the 'villain' of this story. And once again, as with the original Pretties world, I found that the economic underpinnings of the portrayed society to be too skimpily described and worked-out to make me fully believe in it. These are quibbles, and many readers probably won't notice them amongst the fast action and all the new surprises this book has.
A good follow-up to the original series, with some fresh and original ideas and characters, well worth reading for those who read the first three books.
--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)
Aya is a 15 year old in a Japanese city, a city which has re-organized its economy around the idea of fame, or face-rank as called here. As a near faceless extra, with a face rank down in the 400,000's, Aya is driven to find a news story that will propel her to fame as one of the best 'kickers' (equivalent to an investigative journalist) around. Accidentally observing a shadowy clique known as the Sly Girls, who for reasons of their own actively avoid fame, doing something both dangerous and fun, she decides that doing a story about this group will be a decidedly great way to help her in her quest to become something other than a nonentity. But the story of the Sly Girls leads her to a much larger story, one with potentially deadly consequences for the entire world, and one which will eventually attract the attention of the person with the #1 face-rank, Tally Youngblood, while at the same time involve Aya in the moral and ethical quandaries that journalism sometimes leads to.
The plot line is good, leading to some very unexpected corners of the world, and Aya is well drawn. The new society portrayed here makes an interesting contrast to that of the mind-hobbled Pretties, as without those mental limitations this new world shows a vibrancy of many different people heading off in all directions, from tech geek-hood to obsessive gossip-generating stunts. There's even some sly satire about things like how some people try to improve their Google rank today with a group in Aya's world who try to artificially boost someone's face rank by mentioned that person's name again and again.
The above is all good, but I found a few things that nagged. There are some technical bobbles, which are difficult to detail without giving away the plot, but I'll give one example. When you accelerate a multi-ton piece of steel to orbital escape velocity in an air-evacuated tunnel, then launch it up into the air, the result will be a very loud bang, hearable for miles around, and this thunder will continue following the projectile for a very long way. This is not good if you are trying to conceal the launch of such a projectile, especially if you are launching hundreds of these objects. There are some plausibility issues with the methods and aims of what turns out to be the 'villain' of this story. And once again, as with the original Pretties world, I found that the economic underpinnings of the portrayed society to be too skimpily described and worked-out to make me fully believe in it. These are quibbles, and many readers probably won't notice them amongst the fast action and all the new surprises this book has.
A good follow-up to the original series, with some fresh and original ideas and characters, well worth reading for those who read the first three books.
--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
wrong book!
Id reccomend getting it from a reliable seller even if it does cost more.. I bought one of the 1p ones but still had to pay for postage and packaging, and when it arrived it was... Read more
Published 11 months ago by rachel
Unimpressed
After really enjoying the Uglies trilogy I bought this book as soon as amazon recomended it to me. However it really disapointed me as it was very predictable and although a few... Read more
Published on 11 Oct 2008 by Dramaqueen
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
![[Start the discussion]](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/02/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/start-new-discussion-sec._V192198663_.gif){kind=small}
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
