From Goodreads,"Thou shalt kill.
A world with no hunger, no disease, no war, no misery. Humanity has conquered all those things, and has even conquered death. Now scythes are the only ones who can end life—and they are commanded to do so, in order to keep the size of the population under control.
Citra and Rowan are chosen to apprentice to a scythe—a role that neither wants. These teens must master the “art” of taking life, knowing that the consequence of failure could mean losing their own."
Goodreads - Scythe
Awards and Nominations:
- Michael L. Printz Award Nominee (2017)
- Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction (2017)
- Premio El Templo de las Mil Puertas Nominee for Mejor novela extranjera pertenceciente a saga (2017)
- Missouri Gateway Readers Award Nominee (2018)
- Rhode Island Teen Book Award (2018)
- Grand Prix de I'Imaginaire Nominee for Roman jeunesse etranger (2018, 2019)
- South Carolina Book Award Nominee for Young Adult (2019)
- Lincoln Award Nominee (2019)
- Rebecca Caudill Young Readers Book Award Nominee (2020)
About a month ago my boyfriend and I decided to go on an outing because we were tired of being cooped up with all the restrictions. We ended up at Books-A-Million so I could use a gift card I got for teacher appreciation week. While shopping I spotted Scythe on the shelf as recommended reads for young adults. I remembered it being on at least one of the award lists that I'm reading through. Luckily, when I got home I found that it was on two lists, the Missouri Gateway Readers Award and the Arkansas Teen Award Level 1. The fact that it was on two of my lists, moved it to the top of my TBR (To Be Read) list.
Imagine a world where humans had access to everything and it made us immortal. If you jumped off a building you would "splat" and be taken to a revival center to be revived. In Scythe that is exactly what life is like. No one can die unless it is at the hand of a scythe. A scythe is the only person that can glean or kill another person. Scythe Faraday decides to take on two apprentices, Citra and Rowan, to train them to become scythes. Everything becomes complicated when they find out that only one can become a scythe, while the other must be gleaned by the victor.
I am beyond glad that I am reading through these award lists because it really introduces me to books that I normally wouldn't read. Just by glancing at the cover, I wouldn't normally want to read this. But this book was really good. So good in fact that just 40 pages in I stopped to order the other two books in the series. The entire book in a way centers around "The Thunderhead" which is an advancement of what we call "The Cloud". Humans have access to everything which makes them brilliant, and as a result, everyone is now in a way immortal. If you start to look old you can "turn a corner" and reset your age back to a younger you. This is resulting in people resetting multiple times and continuing to have multiple children. The world is becoming overpopulated and no one can die. But a scythe has the power to glean or kill someone. They make the decision if your time is up and they choose the way that you will die. This entire concept is completely wild. Just think about what you would do with your life if you knew you couldn't die. Would you be more daring because you couldn't die or would you continue living life as you always have? I like to think that I would be more daring and try more things. I'm a very cautious person and I consider every scenario that could happen. But I like to think that I would "live my best life" and try different things because it wouldn't matter. I wouldn't be able to die. I would just be revived and in a few days would resume life as normal. But even more, think about what life would be like if we had scythes running around. It would be terrifying to see one because it could mean the death of you or someone else nearby. Then it becomes a question of who is suitable to be a scythe. I feel like no matter what "screening" process you had there would always be people who were in it just to kill people. The entire concept of this book is so crazy to wrap your head around, but it is also amazingly intriguing.
Unfortunately, the content of this book makes it unsuitable for my 5th-grade classroom. I suggested it to our librarian and she didn't think the content would be suitable for the library either. I always hate to be that person that closely monitors what books go into my library, but it is also a fact of what will my students take away from this if they read it. This is a very mature book and would be perfect in a high school library. There were a few cuss words, but it didn't take away from the book.
This book was amazing and I'm so excited to share my review of the next two books Thunderhead and The Toll. This book is a perfect book for high school-aged students. I give it 5 stars. I hope the other two books in this series live up to my expectations!
Imagine a world where humans had access to everything and it made us immortal. If you jumped off a building you would "splat" and be taken to a revival center to be revived. In Scythe that is exactly what life is like. No one can die unless it is at the hand of a scythe. A scythe is the only person that can glean or kill another person. Scythe Faraday decides to take on two apprentices, Citra and Rowan, to train them to become scythes. Everything becomes complicated when they find out that only one can become a scythe, while the other must be gleaned by the victor.
I am beyond glad that I am reading through these award lists because it really introduces me to books that I normally wouldn't read. Just by glancing at the cover, I wouldn't normally want to read this. But this book was really good. So good in fact that just 40 pages in I stopped to order the other two books in the series. The entire book in a way centers around "The Thunderhead" which is an advancement of what we call "The Cloud". Humans have access to everything which makes them brilliant, and as a result, everyone is now in a way immortal. If you start to look old you can "turn a corner" and reset your age back to a younger you. This is resulting in people resetting multiple times and continuing to have multiple children. The world is becoming overpopulated and no one can die. But a scythe has the power to glean or kill someone. They make the decision if your time is up and they choose the way that you will die. This entire concept is completely wild. Just think about what you would do with your life if you knew you couldn't die. Would you be more daring because you couldn't die or would you continue living life as you always have? I like to think that I would be more daring and try more things. I'm a very cautious person and I consider every scenario that could happen. But I like to think that I would "live my best life" and try different things because it wouldn't matter. I wouldn't be able to die. I would just be revived and in a few days would resume life as normal. But even more, think about what life would be like if we had scythes running around. It would be terrifying to see one because it could mean the death of you or someone else nearby. Then it becomes a question of who is suitable to be a scythe. I feel like no matter what "screening" process you had there would always be people who were in it just to kill people. The entire concept of this book is so crazy to wrap your head around, but it is also amazingly intriguing.
Unfortunately, the content of this book makes it unsuitable for my 5th-grade classroom. I suggested it to our librarian and she didn't think the content would be suitable for the library either. I always hate to be that person that closely monitors what books go into my library, but it is also a fact of what will my students take away from this if they read it. This is a very mature book and would be perfect in a high school library. There were a few cuss words, but it didn't take away from the book.
This book was amazing and I'm so excited to share my review of the next two books Thunderhead and The Toll. This book is a perfect book for high school-aged students. I give it 5 stars. I hope the other two books in this series live up to my expectations!
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