Awaken

Awaken
Author: Katie Kacvinsky
pages:309
publication date: May 23 2011






Summary:
Maddie lives in a world where everything is done on the computer. Whether it’s to go to school or on a date, people don’t venture out of their home. There’s really no need. For the most part, Maddie’s okay with the solitary, digital life—until she meets Justin. Justin likes being with people. He enjoys the physical closeness of face-to-face interactions. People aren’t meant to be alone, he tells her.

Suddenly, Maddie feels something awakening inside her—a feeling that maybe there is a different, better way to live. But with society and her parents telling her otherwise, Maddie is going to have to learn to stand up for herself if she wants to change the path her life is taking.

In this not-so-brave new world, two young people struggle to carve out their own space.





Review:
Honestly this book really made me change my mind about judging a book by its cover. When I first saw this cover I wasn’t really interested, it didn’t look interesting at all. But I’m so glad I read Awaken, it’s such an amazing book. I still don’t see the cover fitting the book though, I don’t know why.

Maddie and Justin are in a new age that is bound to happen someday, they live in a world where technology is everything, they don’t have any physical books, they wanted to save the trees so now they have fake plastic trees and grass. They don’t go outside, they walk on beaches, go on dates, they do everything with technology.

Maddie has gone against the digital system before. The only problem is her dad kind of invented the Digital system. She hacked into her dad’s computer once before and payed for it. She can’t do it again. But then she meets Justin and his group of friends who are against the digital system. They have been tracking her for 3 years and have finally come into contact with her finally.

As the book progresses Justin and Maddie get closer, meaning lots of tension and holding back emotions. I really loved Justin and Maddie’s characters. They were the most real people that I have read in a long time.

What I mean by that is Justin and Maddie both have difficult pasts and they put up a kind of force field around them that doesn’t allow them to share their emotion and show people what their feeling. Justin has never grown up with his parents ever since the protest that happened years ago, ever since he has been the most selfless person on the planet. He wants to save the world with groups at a time, nothing will stand in his way until he meets Maddie, then his feeling show and he is conflicted.

Then Maddie hacked into his dad’s files and shared secret files to protesters, she has never been trusted by her father again, in fact I almost feel bad for Maddie, her dad put tracking devices and has hired people to follow to make sure she wouldn’t get in trouble again. Of course I did feel a tad bit annoyed with Maddie, she did seem a bit needy and she took pity on herself so often, almost made me felt like she thought she was the only person who was going through rough times.

Awaken takes place in 2060 and the way that technology has taken over everyone’s life almost feels like in some way that’s the way it is here. It’s definitely not as drastic as it is now but it’s getting there. We have so many new communication devices coming out and if you look around almost every single person owns a phone. Maddie’s friend Erin won’t even look Maddie in the eye she’s too busy on her Digital device. I feel like that’s happening now. I am guilty of doing it too, but reading this has really opened my eyes to take a look around and see what’s happening to our world around us. Are we going to depend so much on our technology like the characters in Awaken? I hope not, but I really can’t wait for the sequel of this book.


5/5 stars