Summary
Thirteen-year-old
Kyra has grown up in an isolated community without questioning the fact that
her father has three wives and she has twenty brothers and sisters. That is,
without questioning it much—if you don’t count her visits to the Ironton County
Mobile Library on Wheels to read forbidden books, or her secret meetings with
Joshua, the boy she hopes to choose for herself instead of having a man chosen
for her. But when the Prophet decrees that Kyra must marry her sixty-year-old
uncle—who already has six wives—she must make a desperate choice in the face of
violence and her own fears of losing her family forever.
- Number of pages: 213
Review
I’ve had my eye on The
Chosen One for quite some time now. It’s one of those books that I knew I
had to read, a book with a story that I wouldn’t soon forget . . . and I was
right. This is a very powerful book. There is a story in here that really did
leave me in shock. It took me around 4 hours to read. The book isn’t very big
to begin with, but add that to the fact that this is a story that you cant put
down, and it’s easy to see why it would be hard to stop in the middle.
Kyra is a confused girl living in a world that isn’t sane.
She is the daughter of a man . . . and three mothers, as well as a sister of 20 kids. Not
the usual Brady Bunch circumstances. Is she happy? She could be considered a
content girl. Does she feel like something is wrong with her community? She’s
felt it for many years now. They tell her not to read, not to love, not to
wander from their given path. You see how her mind tries to follow their ways,
but her heart really doesn’t give a shit whether or not “the Prophet” for sees
her life a certain way or not. It’s actually very hard to see how she tries to
obey, but really cant help herself when she tries to do what is right. There
was one specific moment involving a baby and ice water that really left me in
shock. I wont give you the circumstances, but when you read it you’ll know what
I’m talking about. I guess Kyra would continue living like this if it were for
the fact that one night, the Prophet comes to her house and proclaims that she
is to marry her 60 year old uncle who already has six wives, while Kyra is only
13. How disgusting is that? This story is her process through denial, hope,
survival, and escape. This is a story through the lives of polygamists and
barbarians and child/women abusers. The story was truly heart stopping. It was
both unrealistic to me and completely realistic to those who really have to
live through that. It really showed me how my life situations aren’t the only
ones, that there are many other types of lives and circumstances that I probably
wouldn’t comprehend. It opened my eyes a bit, and I don’t regret it. From 1-10?
The Chosen One gets a 6.5
excellent review!!!!
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