(The Blemished, #3)
Release Date: 2013
Publisher: Sarah Dalton; 307 pages
“I wanted to live. I wanted us to have a future, and there was nothing else on my mind. With Daniel by my side I ran so fast my lungs ached.”
Mina’s world is turned upside down as an important person from her past materialises to take her away from the Compound. She finds herself separated from her friends and facing life-changing decisions on her own.
Meanwhile Daniel is on a mission to find Mina when he becomes involved in the Resistance – along with the rest of the Freaks. His visions take their toll as he learns of an event that could devastate the people he loves the most. Only he can stop it.
Angela finds herself on the adventure of a lifetime as she helps Sebastian find his father in Area 14. After action and adventure on the way there, the group are thrown into another life and death situation... can Angela find a way out?
Fans of the popular YA dystopia series Blemished will not be disappointed by this thrilling conclusion. It will keep you guessing right up to the very last page.
Trust no one.
I have to say as soon as I finished book 2, I was SO happy that I had book 3, The Unleashed right here waiting for me. No way I could have handled that wait! But if I had to, it would have been more then worth it!
Book 2 left off with Mina seeing her mother, for the first time in 10 years, and alive. Mina is so angry at her father for keeping her mother away, she is automatically blinded by what her mother truly is. I wanted to smack Mina a few times in this book. She was being so stupid. But her feelings for her long lost mother clouded her judgement. This book was written in a few different view points. Usually it is nice to break i up and get others perspectives but sometimes I didn't want to read about Angela or Daniel. All about Mina!
Everyone grew up so incredibly fast in this series. I suppose they had to, but wow. Book 3 is just mind blowing. When I read the blurb, I was thinking to myself, why is Angela going to Area 14 with Sebastian? It makes sense now, but at first I was like odd? Talking about growing up fast. Angela is faced with so much at her young age, both good and bad. I am very glad she didn't lose herself in this series. Mina however, did. But it wasn't her fault. I love how everyone's focus was to fight obviously, but it was always to help Mina.
I could go on and on about everything I loved. Which is the whole book, but I just have to say, hands down, Best Dystopian series EVER! Do yourself a favor and pick up this book! I cried so much in this last book, it was very emotional and you felt for each of the characters. I don't want to explain too much because I don't want to give away anything. Amazing story, one I' constantly thinking about and one I can read over and over again!!!
Excerpt #3 (Book #3 The Unleashed)
We
travelled down a few levels and stepped out into a light, airy hallway with
pale linoleum floors. I let my fingers trail the smooth white-washed walls.
Mum’s shoes tapped against the hard surface as she hurried us along. I saw the
sign on the wall saying “Floor Eight” in green. To the right, I peered through
the window to see a room with lots of long tables, computers and strange
machines that reminded me of the printers at school, except they had little
trays and a touch screen. I followed Mum into the room. It was empty apart from
the equipment.
“This
is one of my old offices,” she said. “And this is a DNA Sequencer.” She trailed
her hand over the machine that resembled a printer. “We make the genes for the
babies here.” She lifted a flap and pointed to a small crevice inside. “We put
a sample here and programme the machine to sequence the DNA from the sample.”
She moved her hand across to the computer next to it on the table. “And then we
change the DNA in the computer. We make the genes better – stronger, more
athletic, more beautiful – and then we create the egg. We create life.”
“This
is where you make the GEMs?” I asked. I didn’t know what to make of the little
machine and the computer. I’d never thought about the origins of the GEMs before.
I’d certainly never imagined them made from something so simple. This all
seemed so banal; almost dull.
“Yes.”
All
the time I’d imagined something monstrous. I’d imagined evil doctors taking
scalpels to babies – cutting them up to make perfection – and yet it was
nothing more than a little grey box.
“It’s
not as bad as I thought,” I said. “I thought it was going to be… I don’t know.”
“Gruesome?”
she asked. She raised an eyebrow in amusement.
“Yeah,
I guess so.” I laughed.
“Mina,
you’ve been expecting pure evil where there is nothing but human nature. You
imagined Frankenstein’s monster and instead you have a new form of normality.
Did your dad ever tell you that designer babies existed for decades before the
Fracture?”
I
shook my head.
“No,
I’m sure that wasn’t on his agenda,” she muttered. “The truth is that
geneticists have been helping families conceive for years, only back then we
didn’t have artificial wombs, and we didn’t improve genes. Parents weren’t
given as many options. The Ministry wanted little more then to empower parents. To ensure they brought
the life they really wanted into this world.”
“But
what if they just want to have a normal baby?”
“A
normal baby,” she said with a thin
smile. “Yes, it’s easy to label natural conception with the normal label and
think everything else freakish. Isn’t that how people treat your powers?”
I
blushed with shame.
“Come
on,” she said, slipping an arm over my shoulders. “We’ll go to the artificial
wombs. They are very beautiful… if a little shocking at first.”
She
led the way to a set of stairs and we climbed one storey. At the doors to the
lab Mum took some items from a supply cupboard and handed them to me. The
unopened plastic crinkled in my hands.
“Put
these on,” she said. “It’s a sterile environment.”
I
opened the plastic cases to find latex gloves, horrible little latex hats, and
booties; all in an unflattering shade of bright blue. I followed Mum’s
directions and pulled on the booties over my shoes. She tucked escaping hairs
under the elastic of my hat.
“That’s
better. Come on!” She stepped forward and opened the wide doors with aplomb –
waving me through like a tour guide.
I
took my tentative first steps into the lab and had my breath taken from me. It
was less of a room and more like a huge factory floor. People busied around
with clipboards, as they chatted and leaned over small incubators lining the
floor like hospital beds. An orange glow emanated from them – reminding me of
sunlight.
“This
way,” Mum instructed. She strutted off to the nearest incubator. “Here you can
see the foetus growing in the artificial womb.”
The
blood froze in my body. The skin of the yellow womb – shaped into an oval pod –
had a transparent quality and pulsated in a rhythmic heartbeat. It lay like a
severed stomach on a white tray with wires and veins crossing the skin of the
womb. The wires ran to a socket. The wombs were plugged in like electric fans.
“Does
it run on electricity?” I asked. “If you pull the plug does the foetus die?” I
leaned over them, trying to see through the skin to see the half-formed baby
inside. All I made out was a slightly pink lump.
“We
have back-up generators, so that wouldn’t happen,” Mum answered. A dark
expression passed over her face as though the question troubled her.
I
spotted a chart hanging from the white tray. It said – Smith. The parents. It
felt so strange to think the baby had an owner. Like a reserved puppy in a pet
shop.
Author Bio
Sarah
grew up in the middle of nowhere in the countryside of Derbyshire and
as a result has an over-active imagination. She has been an avid reader
for most of her life, taking inspiration from the stories she read as a
child, and the novels she devoured as an adult.
Sarah mainly writes speculative fiction for a young adult audience and has had pieces of short fiction published in the Medulla Literary Review, Apex Magazine, PANK magazine and the British Fantasy Society publication Dark Horizons. Her short story ‘Vampires Wear Chanel’ is featured in the Wyvern Publication Fangtales available from Amazon.
The Blemished series is Sarah’s first full-length work of fiction. In a Fractured Britain, Mina Hart has to fight against the Genetic Enhancement Ministry to win back her rights.
www.theblemished.com
@sarahdalton
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