Love Sami: Nought on romance & a Cross on adventure

Noughts & Crosses (Noughts & Crosses #1) by Malorie Blackman
Rating: 3 out of 5 hearts
479 pages
Buy it @ Book depository
Released: October 2006

"Two young people are forced to make a stand in this thought-provoking look at racism and prejudice in an alternate society.

Sephy is a Cross -- a member of the dark-skinned ruling class. Callum is a Nought -- a “colourless” member of the underclass who were once slaves to the Crosses. The two have been friends since early childhood, but that’s as far as it can go. In their world, Noughts and Crosses simply don’t mix. Against a background of prejudice and distrust, intensely highlighted by violent terrorist activity, a romance builds between Sephy and Callum -- a romance that is to lead both of them into terrible danger. Can they possibly find a way to be together?

In this gripping, stimulating and totally absorbing novel, black and white are right and wrong".

Review

I have wanted to read this one for ages. Many years ago I took it home and couldn't get into it, then one day the audio book version was sitting on the shelf at the library and I thought I'd give it another go. It started off good but before long I found myself getting a little bored. The idea of an alternate world where dark-skinned people govern over the pale-skinned people was really interesting and gave lots of insight into racism and prejudice in society. I enjoyed the main story line but I didn't connect with the characters and I felt they weren't that well developed. Sephy was really irritating in the beginning and she didn't get any better towards the end. Callum was likable, I think because you can really feel what he's going through.

I felt like the romance between Sephy & Callum wasn't there, there was no spark and I didn't get any of those butterfly in the tummy feelings. The adventure was also lacking, a few things were a bit predictable and usually I don't pick up on things. Overall, it was a little bit of a let down.

The ending of the book was really disappointing, I'm a sucker for a happy ending and that's not what I got. I get that maybe the book was trying to show that society can be really backward and that you can't get away with doing bad things in your past, But I wasn't expecting that ending at all. I understand what the book was trying to achieve but for me I didn't really fall in love with this.

I had such mixed feeling after reading this, I didn't know what to think then and I don't know what to think now. I'll still read the next one to see what happens next mainly because I'm curious where the story will go.

{I'm probably not the best person to review this and I hate to say anything bad about a book that an author worked so hard to write but this is just my opinion, you should still give the book a go to prove me wrong}