Crewel: a Book Review

At first, Crewel by Gennifer Albin seems like yet another dystopian trilogy, which it essentially is. A girl from an unprepossessing sector of the community is moving in to her adult role in the community. There are two love interests, government corruption, and evil all around. The original premise is very interesting, reminding me a little of that movie with Matt Damon, The Adjustment Bureau, where there is a secret "behind the scenes group" physically building our lives and controlling what will happen, adjusting things when people use free will and accidentally mess up what we might describe as fate or serendipity.

Arras is a world woven of unusual fibers that can only be seen by certain people, and of those, only a few have the skills to weave the world. Even the weather and landscape can be woven, which has done away with famine. The people of Arras live simply, with few changes of clothing, simple meals, and saving for special things, so although no one is struggling to stay alive, no one is living a life of privilege and luxury.  Only women can be born with the ability to be a Weavers. At the age of 16 all girls are tested for several days, weeding out those who don't have the ability each day. Each day a few girls make the grade and the Guild comes that night to take them to take them to their new home. It is a huge honor to be chosen as a Weaver, and every family wants their daughters to be selected.  Weavers live in a gorgeous palace-like building with servants to do everything for them as well as plenty of food and other luxuries. Annalise does not want to be chosen and her parents, who work for the government and know other things about the life of the Weavers, don't want it either. Once they enter their new home, they never come out to visit their families and families cannot visit them. They never marry and have children, and close individual friendships are discouraged. Unfortunately for Annalise not only does she have the ability to weave, she is one of the most gifted in generations. Because of the skepticism of her parents, she looks at everything in a different light than the other girls, who are jealous of her special status. She has questions about everything, which people avoid answering.

This book was "recommended" to me by the computer at goodreads. At the time I had read several of those knitting-club-friendship books, so the title probably confused the bot. It had a pretty cover, and I am a huge criminal of choosing books by their cover, so I put it on at the library and brought it home. When I sat down to begin reading and read the front panel blurb I almost groaned. I was a little sick of dystopian societies from Divergent, The Maze, and re-reading The Giver. But, I tried it out and didn't put it down all night. In the end, the only thing that disappointed me was the conclusion, because it was an obvious cliff-hanger, setting people up to read/buy the next. But I blame that on editors jumping on the bandwagon of the current popularity of these stories. The two follow-up books are Unraveled and Altered, which I will also be getting at my local library as part of the Snagged at the Library Challenge.