Brooke's Reviews > Pure

4.5 stars.

Pure is a gritty, intense, gruesome, disturbing, gripping and incredibly original post-apocalyptic / dystopian novel.

Set in a world 10 years after what could only be described as a nuclear holocaust, the Detonations, the reader is quickly made aware that there are two distinct groups of people. The first are the Pures, a 'superior' group of healthy, well cared for individuals with (seemingly) no imperfections. The Pures are people who were either inside a structure called the Dome, designed to withstand a disaster like the Detonations, or those lucky enough to make it in in the moments following the disaster. The second group are the wretches, people who were not in or around the Dome, people who have been fused to metal, glass, animals, objects, nature and even other people. The thing they are fused to is whatever (or whoever) they were standing closest to or holding on to when the Detonations took place.

Pressia is a wretch. She lives in an abandoned Barber shop with her grandfather and pet Cicada, Freedle, left to scavenge and barter for food with trinkets she learned to make from scraps of metal and wire she recovers from the debris on the streets. As is the law, when Pressia's 16th birthday rolls around, her name is listed on a notice, indicating that it is her time to turn herself in to the OSR to be trained as a Soldier or worse, used as a live target for Soldier training. Pressia's Grandfather tells her she must escape, she knows they will be looking for her, so she turns to an acquaintance for somewhere to hide.

Bradwell is the acquaintance, a fellow wretch with birds fused into his back. Bradwell has been living alone since approximately 9 years of age, after his parents were murdered in their sleep. His carers were killed in the detonations, and he has well and truly learnt to fend for himself. Together, he and Pressia hear rumors of a Pure who has escaped from the Dome. Such an escape is unheard of, and it isn't long before rumors are running wild.

Partridge, a Pure, is the son of Ellery Willux, the man in charge of the Dome and also one of the Dome's original creators. After his brother's apparent suicide, and being told that his mother was killed trying to save victims of the Detonations, Partridge feels more alone then ever and decides that he wants out.

The three meet, cue action. The story alternates between 5 points of view (the other two being additional characters were are introduced to, El Capitan and Lyda - I will leave their stories for you to discover on your own) which may sound like a lot, however is wonderfully executed. It was easy to keep up with each alternation as the story flowed flawlessly - while you may be going from an outside-of-the-dome setting to an inside-the-dome setting, everything continues on in sequence.

As someone has described an another early review, Pure has the perfect balances character and plot development, each spurred on by the other. There were pages which felt a bit like 'fillers' and didn't really add anything to the book and, if anything, caused a bit of a lull in the story progression. They certainly didn't detract from my enjoyment of the book as a whole though, but they could be removed and nothing would be missed.

As for the comparisons to Suzanne Collins' 'The Hunger Games' I don't think that the comparisons really warranted, if I am being honest. The two are incredibly different, and while there are similarities (i.e. the Dome "bugs" people - they can see, hear what the bugged person is seeing / hearing, similar to the Capitol monitoring the Districts / Tributes etc.), the plots are most certainly, unrelated and not comparable.

I eagerly await the release of the next book in this series, I can't wait to see where things go from here. An excellent novel from Julianna Baggott!

Nic - on to you next!