Flawed: A Novel

Flawed is set in a society where perfection rules, any anything outside of being perfect is unacceptable. The main character, Celestine, is a straight-A student who is dating a powerful Judge's son, and is an all around rule following good-girl. That is, until she breaks a society rule in an act of compassion. This results in her arrest and subsequent trial. The trial will determine what her punishment will be, and most of all, will determine if she is found to be Flawed. Being Flawed means your skin is branded, you wear an armband that marks you as Flawed (think Scarlett Letter), and you follow a different set of rules. No luxuries, bland food, curfews, and ultimately being shunned form society. As the trial results are announced, Celestine finds there are a large number of people who support her choice and are ready to make their own play at overthrowing the government. Flawed follows Celestine as she works to find out who she can trust, and what actions she needs to take next. I really enjoyed this book! I'm a big fan of books set in dystopian societies, and while this one wasn't overtly dystopian, it still fits the bill. I liked watching the characters progress through the book in terms of beliefs - in the beginning of the book, so much of what they believe was black and white, and by the end there are definitely shades of grey. The book ends on a cliffhanger (noooooo!) so I'm really excited for it's sequel, Perfect, which comes out in April 2017. I can't wait to read it! I will say, that if you read To All the Boys I've loved Before by Jenny Han and didn't care for Lara Jean, you will likely not like Celestine. She's much in the same vain in regards to being incredibly eager to be perfect and follow the rules, without stepping a toe out of line. They remind me a lot of each other, so if you don't like one, you probably won't like the other. For me, it wasn't a problem, I liked both characters, even though there were definitely a few times I wanted to slap Celestine for being so naive and innocent. I don't remember being that naive in High School, but who knows! Maybe I was! Anyway, I definitely recommend to anyone who enjoys young adult dystopian novels, and I will absolutely be reading Perfect when it comes out next year!

Totally not what I expected. Set in a dystopian society were following the rules and social norms strictly enforced and perfection is the goal, Celestine North is the model citizen: beautiful, straight-A student who is logical and is the girlfriend of the son of the most powerful judge in the country. Normally the rule-follower, she is shaken and confused by the recent rulings of the court. The first is her neighbor who took her dying mother outside the country to be euthanized, following her dying mother's wish to end her pain and suffering. Her neighbor is branded and declared "Flawed" since she stole a life even though she did not break any laws inside the country. The second is a famous sports player who cheated on his wife but is found not guilty or not "Flawed" even though there is plenty of evidence that he did commit the crime. The fact that the judge in the case owns a significant part of the sports league that this famous player is a part of and being declared "Flawed" would prevent him from traveling internationally with the team and severely restrict his life has the public and Celestine questioning the fairnesss of this "Flawless" court. When Celestine speaks up and tries to save a Flawed man life on a bus, she is arrested for aiding a Flawed and is put on public trial. Celestine's life will be forever changed no matter what the outcome but can she live with herself if she lies and tries to save herself from the fate of being "Flawed"? I could have read this book in 1 day if I could have kept my eyes open last night to finish it. It was deeply moving to me and showed me what bullying is like when taken to the extreme in a society, to the point where some people in society are seen a less-than-human and have their rights taken away and their lives severely restricted over lapse of judgment or thought different from the accepted norm. I felt the anger and the frustration of the Flawed and those who questioned the morality of the society but were afraid to speak up in fear of being declared "Flawed." A great dystopian novel that O would highly recommend to all especially young adults and dystopian readers. I gave this a 4 out of 5 on Goodreads.

Flawed by Cecelia Ahern is a fast paced dystopic novel. Celestine North lives in a world where one bad decision can alter your entire life. Her boyfriend’s dad (Judge Crevan) works as a judge on the Guild, which is responsible for marking people who are “Flawed”. If you are caught making an immoral or unethical decision, you are dragged before the court, and most of the time, found guilty and branded as flawed in one of five places depending on what you did (forehead for bad decisions, hand for stealing from society, chest for disloyalty to the Guild, foot for walking away from society, tongue for lies). These Flawed people then have to live ostracized from society. They have different seats on the bus that they can only sit there (think segregated buses, same concept, perfect people can sit in flawed seats but flawed people can’t sit in regular people seats), no alcohol, no sweets, and no one can help the flawed. Celestine always thought this was supposed to protect society from the unethical and evil people who don’t break laws but put society at risk by doing things that are unethical. Until she sees a Flawed old man that reminds her of her grandfather, coughing on a bus while two perfect people sit in the only flawed seat. She asks them to move and they refuse, and she helps the old man sit down, afraid he will die. This leads to her being on trial for “helping” a flawed, being judged by her boyfriend’s father. This is when she starts to question her world, and suspect that the Flawed aren’t so flawed and the Guild may in fact be quite corrupt and Judge Crevan, may even be using it to achieve his personal vendettas. Will she be found guilty? What will this mean for her future? Read this book and find out what happens when compassion is seen as a bad decision. Be ready for a roller coaster of emotion. It’s a quick read and beautifully written. Pulled me in right away!

This is the book that was featured in my most recent Owl Crate I obtained. For those who aren't aware as to what the Owl Crate is, it's similar to that of Loot Crate but instead features a new book with several additional nerdy items related to that month's theme. The theme this time was Dystopia. follow this link to find out more and purchase one for yourself if you so wish--- [...] So as mentioned earlier this book is a dystopia novel. The concept revolves around a government agency called the Guild who basically takes people who make mistakes of judgement, seen as stealing from society, disloyalty towards the Guild, and lying are judged and labelled by branding as being Flawed and are no longer allowed to participate or obtain any of the luxuries of life. However, the issue with this whole system is that it follows the views of certain people as being flawed or not causing a huge room for corruption. After the perfect girl who has never been in trouble, made straight A's and was dating the head judge of the Guild's son, is eventually labelled as being flawed for helping a flawed man who was dying while no one was willing to help begins to lead to an increase in doubt on not only the Guild but the humanity of society as a whole. After her unfair trail and excessive unheard of punishment Celestine North must learn how to adapt in this new life as a flawed human being. The whole story line is well thought out and the novel itself is a quick read. Only spent 3 days reading it myself actually. The situations she goes through makes you angry, sad, thoughtful, and any other extreme emotion you may think of. As she gets stronger and braver despite the constant knockdowns from society, she learns she has the upper hand and if she plays her cards right she may just be able to take down the Guild and most importantly the injustice of the head judge. Sadly.....there's going to be a part 2. Since this was just recently published there's no telling how long it will take for the next novel in this series to come out. (NOOOOOOO!!!!!) Yet I will be impatiently waiting for it's announcement and release. (Yeah it is that good. I want to know what happens damn it!) All in all I'll end with my favorite quote from the author: "If there's one message that I hope this book portrays, it's this: None of us are perfect. Let us not pretend that we are. Let us not be afraid that we're not. Let us not label others and pretend we are not the same. Let us all know that to be human is to be flawed, and let us learn from every mistake made so we don't make them again." I hope everyone takes that quote to heart especially with everything that has been occurring throughout in the news. Just because you may not understand it, doesn't mean you should treat another human being any differently with the same compassion and respect you would want for yourself. Want to read more book reviews? Go to my blog at:[...]

Both book are so incredibly good

Actual rating 3.75 stars. I don’t mind a bit of a dystopian novel every now and then, it takes me back to my younger days of reading filled with nostalgia, wonder and excitement. ‘Flawed’ managed to bring a fun and tense adventure worthy of this genre. There is something righteous (not to mention vindictive and satisfying) about wrong-doers being labelled Flawed as punishment. Adulterers. I can certainly see the appeal. A part of me likes the justification of inflicting a label on the perpetrator after being emotionally scarred in the world of ‘Flawed.’ So too can I see the reasons in preventing people with these flawed tendencies from getting into positions of authority and power. But as soon as that premise is set up, we begin to see the cracks of corruption. That no system is infallible. And our teen protagonist Celestine is trapped in the political rip tide, and has to decide in which moral direction she wants to swim. I like Celestine's thought processes how they began to question small things all leading up to an incident she thought unfair ultimately landing in hot water. She comes from a place of naivety and innocence but with a resounding heart of compassion. This is where we begin to see the formation of her core values, something that drives her through this story. After Celestine is arrested and placed in a holding cell, I did not get her need to please, or comradery with her cell mate Carrick. There seemed to be no motivation or logical reason for her to feel this way other than the author playing God and steering the storyline. This was aspect was the biggest let-down for me – the attraction and concern between Celestine and Carrick initially felt contrived and full of unjustified tension. The sister relationship between Celestine and Juniper annoyed me - I would have liked to have seen a better connection between these two, so that the tension they had for each other was justified an more realistic - it felt a little juvenile. They both had conflicting moral compasses and indignation towards each other that didn’t translate effectively. After reading the likes of ‘To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before’ by Jenny Han and the sisterly bonds described there – both loving and full of conflict, I look for these complex relationships in sisterhood. A shining light was how much I loved Celestine's parents, especially her mother, even though they weren’t too prominent in the storyline. You get a real sense of unconditional love and the lengths they would go to to protect their children. With a common trope of the single parent or absent parents that dominate this genre, ‘Flawed’ really stepped up with this parental representation. Following on from the aforementioned instant attraction above, when it came to Celestine and her thoughts on possible love interest Carrick, all this exposition about her cell-mate - I don't buy it. How can Celestine know what he is thinking all the time? Where is this strong connection coming from? It aggravated me. It wasn’t insta-love, but something equally akin to it, and started off on flimsy footing. Things did get better after this initial stumble… The love interest(s) dropped out priority in the plot and Celestine seemed to get her footing. I actually started to really enjoy ‘Flawed’ then. The pacing got so much better and I no longer felt tripped up on the writing style or plot details. ‘Flawed’ was pretty much Celestine navigating her way through the treacherous world of political power plays, while remaining true to her instincts – these aspects of her character really grabbed me. The plot did feel a little contrived - demonising the 'bad guy' but it didn’t bother me so much. I like a good villain. The environment of mistrust – and everyone having their own agenda… that aspect felt refreshing. Predictable - yes, fun – absolutely! Loved how the conclusion was open-ended. I'm actually excited to get my hands on the sequel 'Perfect.'

Flawed caught my attention, in the fact that everyone had to be perfect. The story is centered around a teenage girl named Celestine. She lives in a world that you have to be perfect, you can never make a mistake or anything. When you make a mistake in this world, you have to go in front of a court and they decide whether or not you are guilty, if you are found guilty you are branded on a part of your body. You can be branded on your temple, chest, hand, the heel of your foot, tongue, and spine. They call this system, The Guild. The Guild is not the law, though, you still have the government and police officers. The Guild is Just a system they developed after their government collapsed, because all their elected officials made awful decisions and caused so much damage, they created the guild. Celestine is perfect, She’s always done everything right, except helping the old man on the bus. The Old man is flawed, he has a brand on his temple. Celestine helps him into his seat because he was sick and coughing, he needed help. Celestine ends up getting branded for helping a sick old man to a seat. She ends up being told to lie in court, so she must be flawed and tell a lie to be deemed not flawed. Celestine ends up telling the truth in court and gets 5 brands, except the judge is so angry with her for telling the truth, he gives her a 6th brand. The 6th brand is not on the record and can get the judge in big trouble if Celestine can save her skin and find the video, She and she only can bring the whole system to an end.

Celestine lives a perfect life. She is 17 years old. In this future world you are either perfect ( first class citizen) or flawed (second class citizen). When Celestine helps a flaw, she is breaking the rules. She is taken to court and found flawed in more ways than one. For each flaw she is branded with an "F" on different parts of her body. She is the first to get five "Fs" ever. She however ends up with six which is impossible supposedly. Why did she get six? She is allowed to go home but must now eat a prescribed menu and has several more rules to follow and she gets a personal whistleblower. She also has no privacy left. Her boyfriend disappears. Why? She has become an entertainment for the perfects. She hates it. She just wants to be herself rather than what everyone thinks she is. This novel grabbed me and I couldn't stop reading or thinking it. I am still thinking about the society in the story. I don't think I could be perfect in that society. This book would be a great book to read in a classroom or in a book club as the discussion would have several different themes to talk about. I can't wait to read the next book!

読みだしたら、止まりませんでした。 読みやすくもあり、ストーリーがスリリングでもあり、 そして、大きなメッセージが込められた作品でもあります。 「間違いをおかしてこそ、失敗してこそ、人は学び成長する！」というメッセージ。 そして、勇気とは何か、強さとは何かも考えさせられます。 17歳の少女の葛藤と成長が、痛々しいほどリアルに描かれています。 けっして、主人公を全面的に美化して描いていないところが、この本のもうひとつの魅力でもあり、 読者は共感しながら、この少女と同じ目線で試練に立ち向かっていく感覚を持てます。 星を５つでなく４つにしたのは、後半で少々もたついた所があったからです。それと、重要な登場人物が後から後から出てくるのはちょっとズルいんじゃないの？と思ってしまいました。

The book was delivered within three days, as usual the book was absolutely in perfect condition. Thanks to amazon for their great discount. I finished reading this book within one and a half days. 'FLAWED' is CECELIA AHERN'S young-adult debut novel. This book has sequel named 'PERFECT' that will be out MARCH,2017. About the book - This book is about Celestine North. She lives a perfect life with her sister Juniper, brother Ewan and her parents. She is loved by all her friends and teachers. She is a brilliant student having interest in mathematics. She is also dating the very charming Art Crevan. Celestine lives in such a country where there is a government run institute called THE GUILD. THE GUILD has made some rules that makes the society and country more perfect. The persons who does not follow these rules or show disloyalty to them will be marked as a FLAWED one with branding marks on specific part of their body, that ruins their future forever. These flawed persons are not even criminals but the punishment they get is worse. It is even against the rule to aid a FLAWED. On the way to her school, Celestine watches an old man getting on the bus whom she thought to be her grand father by mistake. There were two other non-flawed ladies who were already sitting in the flawed seats assigned for a flawed person. The old man starts coughing and gradually he starts losing control of his body as he coughs to death. But nobody comes to his help only because he is Flawed and helping him is against the rule. Unable to see this inhuman situation, Celestine could not control herself. She gets up and asks the two ladies to move to other empty non flawed seats and make the old man sit in his flawed sit. but those two old woman did not agree to move. They were so arrogant they did not even care that the old man was almost fainting there. So, Celestine stopped the bus and was helping the old man to sit in a non-flawed seat but the old man tried his best not to sit there as it was against the rule. Suddenly the whistleblowers arrived took Celestine away into the Highland Castle where she met Carrick a FAB(flawed at birth). Then after the judgement she was marked flawed 6 times(which qas not in the law). A person can be flawed maximum at 5 places of the body. Judge Crevan(Art's father) came to the branding chamber expecting Celestine to repent but she didn't so he out of his rage and greed of power branded her spine. Since that day Celestine's life changed. She became a hero, riots started everywhere. Now the question is whether she will win over this inhuman GUILD. My thoughts: This book seemed so real to me that I felt the rage and anger of Celestine. I loved the character of Celestine, Carrick, Juniper and her granddad. Is it a sin to show compassion, love, kindness to a person ? Why should we discriminate a person based on his/her flaws. We are human, social beings and we should help each other in their needs. The story was like an allegory to our society of the present day. When Celestine was flawed, she felt like she was all alone,it was hard for her to trust anyone. Everytime she felt like scapegoat setting up for another trap to make her fall in more danger. But at last she will learn that her granddad is there for her. Like that few other people like Carrick,her math tutor, Pia the reporter will help her to survive the situation. There were people who believed in her, considered her as the face of change. Person like Crevan exits to rotten the society. Crevan is so full of power and greedy of becoming more powerful that it made him insane. The people who are there to make the society flawless are themselves flawed. So, I think this story sends a message to every reader to be helpful not to discriminate and look down upon people. Our humanity is something that makes us different from other creatures. Carrick was flawed because he was looking for his flawed parents after he reached 18 years. The Guild was unable to brainwash him like they do to every FAB. It was found out that these rules of The Guild were rather stupid and they were creating division in the society. They were taking away the basic human rights. These rules made no sense, no logic. How do a parent will feel when his/her child will be taken away from him/her only because of a F mark on the body? Is it anyhow justified? This story is not merely like anyother young-adult love story rather this story has depth. The whole plot has a suspense especially when Celestine was set up for a party but instead was humiliated by some of her school friends. I really loved reading this story and learned so many things. Last time I read an Ahern book, I cried and this time I was burning with rage when Celestine was tortured for helping a man who needed help. On the other hand the story was written so simply it was a pleasure reading this book. At the end of this book, the author left the readers in anticipation for the next book as Celestine left her home and went to find Carrick and escape from Judge Crevan. Now that Celestine has so much support and followers will she win this battle against Crevan ?

What started out as an uncomfortable read very quickly became a book i couldn't put down. If you like a book that asks questions, that challenges your comfort zone then read this. Go sit somewhere quiet so you are not disturbed and give this book your whole attention. Trust me, it's worth it!!

This book reminded me a lot of Hunger Games: female heroine that doesn't want to be the hero; the public whose values have been twisted; a counter movement rising against them. Despite the similarities it is a different story, so not boring in reading. On the contrary, it is very thrilling and I could barely put it down. The concept of the Flawed seems more likely to happen in real life than the hunger games and that disturbed me a lot in the beginning, making me think about society and myself. Anyways, can't wait for Perfect to be published!

What a great book! Definitely a book that I read too quickly because I couldn't put it down. And was so upset when it was over because I just wanted it to continue. Highly recommend this book and author.