UnSouled (3) (Unwind Dystology) Paperback – October 14, 2014

I don't give five star ratings very often, and if half-stars existed on Amazon, I'd probably rate it as four and a half stars. Unsouled wasn't a perfect book (not the least because of the rather troubling number of typos in the Kindle edition - not nearly the worst book I've seen when it comes to those, but more than I'm used to seeing in a brand new traditionally published novel - but that's nearly not all), but all in all, it *worked* for me.It was a bit slow-going at first, much like the previous books in this series, and there was less action in it (and less romance - not that there's been overly much of it in the previous books either) - what we got instead was more plot, more politics, more background on this horrible world. I'm still not sure I truly buy the concept; I could just nearly buy people not giving a damn about other people's kids, up to and including getting them chopped up for parts, but I still cannot really believe there would be that many people giving up their own flesh and blood, their own offspring.But then, there are people in the world who think nothing of murdering their own kids for some perceived slight or another, I guess, so anything is possible. I just have trouble seeing it happen in what is supposed to be a relatively close-to-us future and in such huge numbers.Anyway, if one can suspend disbelief and go with that, at least there's a reasonable attempt made here to explain that world, and the reasons people use to keep themselves blindly okay with the new arrangement - and that there are, after all, plenty of people who don't think it's the most awesome of best ideas ever.If there's anything I could have wished for (other than fewer typos) in this book, it's "more Risa"; she's largely absent. Fortunately the other main characters are strong enough and the plot was excellent, so while I missed her, it didn't detract from my general enjoyment.

Can't wait for Book #4! In this 3rd installment of the Unwind Dystology, Connor has been captured by Argent who wants to show him off to the world but Argent is thoroughly disgusting as a character. He has a sister, Grace, who he is so nasty, angry and rude to- she is labeled "low cortical" which means she is lacking in her mental capacity (boy do they get that wrong) but it is Grace who ends up helping Connor escape and goes with him and Lev to find out answers to the unwinds, Proactive Citizenry and try to find Jansen Reinschild's wife, Sonia (they invented unwinding). Argent meets up with Nelson, the parts pirate who is consumed with finding Connor and they are both detestable characters, along with Starkey who thinks he is the God of the Storks and has no moral compass. I enjoyed the parts involving Risa, I can't make up my mind about Cam; I like him sometimes and I don't like him other times. I know he really loves Risa and wants to prove it by taking down Proactive Citizenry and his creator, Roberta but so far he hasn't really escaped Proactive Citizenry. When Connor, Lev and Roberta go to the Indian reservation to be protected things begin to test the friendship of Connor and Lev. Lev is trying to recuperate after being hit by a car driven by Connor and Cam comes to the reservation hoping to find Risa and how Cam knows to go to this reservation is the result of his having some of the "parts" (like the hands) of an Indian who was rewound, yuck! I am looking forward to seeing more development of Grace as a character; she is definitely making herself very useful to Connor and Risa. The whole idea of unwinding and the unscrupulousness of the world towards teens make me cringe---Shusterman has done a fantastic job of creating a dystopian world at odds with teens, life and identity. Couldn't put this book down!

I very much enjoyed this book, but I didn’t feel like it moved the story along very far. It’s a bridge to the big climax: it sets up how the final battle for unwinding will unfold, but it does so very slowly so that the big reveal will feel organic.Here be spoilers!Personally, I could have done without a lot of what feels like wheel spinning in this book. While there’s an argument to be made that it would have felt too rushed to fit in the key points of this story into the finale, this novel doesn’t really stand up on its own merits. (I’d hate to believe that Neal Shusterman was talked into splitting this novel into two parts to make more money, but I’m frankly annoyed that so little happens in this book. It's basically a giant road trip.) This story is all about the journey, and each stop point is only an opportunity for exposition.The entire book is literally all building to the big reveal: the same man who invented unwinding also invented a 3D printer that can produce real, living body parts. But the unwinding community hides the technology because it would destroy their profit. Shusterman drops this information like a bomb in the last chapter of the book, but for me it was letdown. It wasn’t even a surprise. Despite the author’s efforts to drive home how the profitability of unwinding has been woven into the fabric of society, I’m just not buying his logic that cheap body parts would somehow destroy this fabric. Like corporations couldn’t make money off the fake body parts? There’s a disconnect for me here, it feels like a false conflict. Compared to its predecessors, which were incredibly thought provoking, this novel didn’t really bring anything new.That said, it’s a wonderfully written book that was a pleasure to read. Shusterman’s style drips with cynicism, but he is a master at slowing down for emotional drama. This insane world of unwinding is horrifying, and Shusterman continues to bring that home in interesting ways. We catch up with CyFy, who has started a compound to reunite Tyler’s body parts (we already saw this idea in the first book, but okay). Starkey continues to be a destructive madman. By far the most compelling character to me is Cam, and I wish we had spent more time with him trying to answer the question of whether or not he has a soul, if he is really an “I.” I’m also morbidly hoping we’ll find out what Proactive Citizenry is hiding in their rabbit hole. While this book did not enthrall me the same way the first two books did, I am definitely awaiting the final chapter with baited breath.