Cured

Cured by Bethany Wiggins

I read the first book in the series, Stung, HERE.

Disclaimer: This blog post will undoubtedly contain spoilers about the first book, Stung, so read no further if you would like to read the books unspoiled.

Apparently this book was released back in March and I completely missed it. For that, I have a bit of shame. However, I read a ridiculous amount of books, so I feel that it's acceptable to slip and eventually get to them.

Ahem.

Anyways, an amazon summary, "Now that Fiona Tarsis and her twin brother, Jonah, are no longer beasts, they set out to find their mother, with the help of Bowen and a former neighbor, Jacqui. Heading for a safe settlement rumored to be in Wyoming, they plan to spread the cure along the way--until they are attacked by raiders. Luckily, they find a new ally in Kevin, who saves them and leads them to safety in his underground shelter. But the more they get to know Kevin, the more they suspect he has ties to the raiders. He also seems to know too many details about Jacqui and her family—details that could endanger them all. For the raiders will do anything they can to destroy the cure that would bring an end to their way of life. Bethany Wiggins’s reimagining of our world after an environmental catastrophe won’t fail to stun readers." MILDLY MISLEADING AMAZON SUMMARY LINK OF JUSTICE

At the end of Stung, Fiona and Jonah have discovered there is a cure for the terrible vaccine that turned a lot of people into beasts. There was a lot of elements to Stung which made the book fantastic from the world building, characters, and tone; Cured follows neatly in it's place.

At the beginning of Cured, we meet Jacqui. We had actually met Jacqui in Stung, she was the girl right at the beginning who gave Fiona some crackers when she first emerges from her house.

Jacqui's family has been one of the few who have stayed in their home and fight for survival. They have a good system set up of people taking guard at different points, dogs who are ever alert, and even grow their own food in the backyard.

Jacqui and her mother are disguised as men though. Females are too sought after by the raiders for pleasure and entertainment that it's insanely safer for Jacqui and her mother to be disguised as men.

In the beginning, there's a lot of interesting family history, dynamics, and how Jacqui came to be Jack. It leads to a boiling point where Jacqui packs some gear before running off to the walled city. She's looking for her brother who disappeared after escorting a woman to a colony in the mountains where it's rumored to be safe.

Jacqui calls upon Fiona, Jonah, and Bowen (Fiona's romantic interest from the last book) for help. It's revealed that Dean left escorting Fiona's mother to the Rockies (where the allegedly safe colony exists). Jacqui calls on their aid because it's not only safer to travel in numbers, but they also have a vested interest in the adventure.

The world is still a grim, bleek place that puts the adventurers through gruesome terrors.

Cured holds just as much punch as Stung with a few delightful twists that had me a bit slack-jawed.

There were still a lot of 'gross' elements to the story that were fitting based on the tone of the book and what we knew from Stung.

There were only a few moments where I wanted to smack Jacqui for being dense, but it made sense based on how she grew up/the world she had experienced thus far. So really I can't fault the book for writing a realistic narrator based on the story's world. It was good that Jacqui didn't stray from her characteristics, but it was only mildly maddening as the reader, and this is a silly long statement. [/fin]

So many things (like the Raiders) were explained just a little better and articulated more horrifically, but the pacing of the book never dwelled for too long on anything. With everything moving at a good clip, histories entwined with present events, and enough action for a movie; Cured was just fantastic.

Another good show.

Happy reading!