Bumped by Megan McCafferty
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Page Count: 323 pages
Overall Rating: 5 stars
When a virus makes everyone over the age of eighteen infertile, would-be parents pay teen girls to conceive and give birth to their children, making teens the most prized members of society. Girls sport fake baby bumps and the school cafeteria stocks folic-acid-infused food.
Sixteen-year-old identical twins Melody and Harmony were separated at birth and have never met until the day Harmony shows up on Melody’s doorstep. Up to now, the twins have followed completely opposite paths. Melody has scored an enviable conception contract with a couple called the Jaydens. While they are searching for the perfect partner for Melody to bump with, she is fighting her attraction to her best friend, Zen, who is way too short for the job.
Harmony has spent her whole life in Goodside, a religious community, preparing to be a wife and mother. She believes her calling is to convince Melody that pregging for profit is a sin. But Harmony has secrets of her own that she is running from.
When Melody is finally matched with the world-famous, genetically flawless Jondoe, both girls’ lives are changed forever. A case of mistaken identity takes them on a journey neither could have ever imagined, one that makes Melody and Harmony realize they have so much more than just DNA in common.
When I heard what this book was about, I was a bit squeamish. Laugh at me if you will, but it was a book about pregnancy and sex, and well, I didn't know how far the book would go. I can handle the idea, but I don't want any descriptions. I'm just not comfortable with that.
However, after seeing positive review upon positive review, I opened my mind to it a little bit. I thought about it for a while, honestly. I wasn't sure about what I was getting myself into. I didn't want any bit of the awkwardness that I knew would come if the contents weren't what I hoped for. I placed my order on Amazon and waited. I read the first bit of it, carefully.
I'm pleased to say that, after about three chapters, I devoured the rest of it.
It was interesting and disturbing at times. It wasn't disturbing because of anything that was dirty, really. It's just, in this world, there are nine year-olds strapping on fake bellies and gushing about how
fertilicious they look. It's disturbing because those things are considered normal in this world. For the same reason, it was interesting.
I'm not going to grin and bear it and say that this novel was squeaky clean, because, obviously, it wasn't. There was a lot of language in it, mainly (fairly harmless) semi-dirty phrases. They are, of course, referring to sex, but in this novel, a lot of that is used as compliments and joking taunts from friends. There was
one scene that did make me feel a bit uncomfortable, but it really wasn't that bad. I'm sure a lot of people could handle it with no discomfort.
I'm just a five year-old.
I really enjoyed the alternating POVs. I think if the story would've just been told from Melody's point of view, or Harmony's, it wouldn't have been as strong. I am one to believe that we end up taking the side of the character who narrates the story. If you had taken sides with either twin, it would've made them out to be the bad guy and that's not what the story is about at all.
All of the characters were lovely, even the ones who were the bad guys. They all seemed to have deep roots and history and
reasons. Gosh, I
adore it when characters have reasons for what they do, especially if they are doing something wrong or bad. I really hate it when villains are evil just because. That's not the case here. All of the characters have some sort of history, whether it be that they have a mysterious religious past, they were raised to be a surrogate, or they were married at a young age.
Something else that I enjoyed seeing, though it may sound dark and strange, is that the main characters had guilt. I know a lot of books today are fine with having their characters react accordingly, but it was somehow refreshing in this novel. I sincerely believed what they were feeling and thinking. I could see myself thinking and feeling those things, if I were in that scenario.
Something that did annoy me, not enough to lower the rating, obviously, was that occasionally there were words that had been changed for some reason. I assume it either to exaggerate how the word is being said, or how the written word changes as time passes. For example, I noticed that instead of "really" there was "rilly." This didn't happen often, and it wasn't a total replacement. I believe it happened about five times.
I really do hope that you give this book a try. I did and I was quite happy with the results. It's an awesome book. I recommend it one-hundred percent.
Songs I listened to while reading:
