Review: Wither by Lauren DeStefano

Wither by Lauren DeStefano (The Chemical Garden #1)

bought

Synopsis from Goodreads
By age sixteen, Rhine Ellery has four years left to live. She can thank modern science for this genetic time bomb. A botched effort to create a perfect race has left all males with a lifespan of 25 years, and females with a lifespan of 20 years. 

Geneticists are seeking a miracle antidote to restore the human race, desperate orphans crowd the population, crime and poverty have skyrocketed, and young girls are being kidnapped and sold as polygamous brides to bear more children. 

When Rhine is kidnapped and sold as a bride, she vows to do all she can to escape. Her husband, Linden, is hopelessly in love with her, and Rhine can’t bring herself to hate him as much as she’d like to. He opens her to a magical world of wealth and illusion she never thought existed, and it almost makes it possible to ignore the clock ticking away her short life. But Rhine quickly learns that not everything in her new husband’s strange world is what it seems. Her father-in-law, an eccentric doctor bent on finding the antidote, is hoarding corpses in the basement. Her fellow sister wives are to be trusted one day and feared the next, and Rhine is desperate to communicate to her twin brother that she is safe and alive. Will Rhine be able to escape--before her time runs out?

Together with one of Linden's servants, Gabriel, Rhine attempts to escape just before her seventeenth birthday. But in a world that continues to spiral into anarchy, is there any hope for freedom?

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7.5/10

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Funny thing about Wither, it was good and bad at the same time. Pretty depressing, but captivating and poetic read. I would say, if you like this one you should read The Selection by Kiera Cass, although America had guts not like Rhine who just talked the talk but didn't walk the walk until the very end.


The plot is very frustrating. The only one whose behaviour was making sense was the youngest wife, Cecily. She is a child just from the orphanage and this life is what she's been dreaming of.

*MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD*

But Jenna and Rhine... I have no words for them. *shakes head* One had her sisters shot when she was chosen by Linden, another has a twin brother waiting for her... WTF, girls? Do you think Linden can see in your head? Your passive resistance didn't do eff all for him, because men are clueless that way and you have to spell it out to them.

 I was so bloody angry when the girls found out that Linden didn't know how the brides were chosen, that they are snatched from the streets not volunteered. What do you think, Rhine and Jenna did? Right, THEY DIDN'T TELL HIM either! His father is a villain in this book and Linden is a clueless twit but sorry, I would tell everything to him and let him make his own decision... I just wanted to strangle them all and be done with it.

Phew, I'm letting out some steam... I could understand keeping silent if Linden was someone like this...

...a sick psychopath, but it's his father who fits the role.

ARRGH!!!

Anyway, that book was not believable to me, and I would have loved more spark in Rhine and Jenna who had absolutely nothing to lose and could make Linden's life hell if she wanted.

Read at your own risk. It's not a bad read, but it can be extremely frustrating. Similar reads: The Selection by Kiera Cass, Sixteen by Julia Karr.

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Значит так, написано интересно, читается легко, депрессивно и довольно мрачно, однако главная героиня раздражает своей пассивностью до невозможности.

Райн говорит много о том как сбежит и найдёт своего брата, но когда у неё возникает пара возможностей, она трусит и хватается за любое оправдание своему нежеланию свалить от Линдена и жизни вместе с ним в роскоши и довольстве.

Мало того, она жалеет Линдена и когда узнаёт, что он не знал, что её насильно схватили с улиц Нью-Йорка вместе с Дженной, второй женой, чтобы он выбрал невесту, а потом расстреляли всех остальных девчонок включая сестёр Дженны... она решает ему ничего не говорить, щадя его чувства.

Твою мать.

У недобитого тихони Линдена может и есть отец-психопат, который всё это устроил, но какого хрена об этом мальчику не сказать и дать ему принять решение самому что делать с невестами?!

Вот выморозили меня и Райн и Дженна, идиотки. Только малышка Сесили действовала нормально соответственно своему характеру и желаниям, и за это я её уважала.

В общем, читайте на свой страх и риск. Красиво написано, но ужасно раздражает.