Sever by Lauren DeStefano

Yay! Another series down. I had been about to drop this series, but I'm glad I didn't. This is a clear case of the last book making the whole thing worthwhile because it clarified many of the running themes.

 Sever opens with Rhine in a hospital recovering from her harrowing experiences at the mercy of Housemaster Vaughn's medical experimentation. Linden is finally aware of what his father's been doing and Cecily is well on the way to redeeming her mistakes from earlier in the series when she trusted Vaughn overmuch.

Rhine has a new mission to chase down her twin brother, Rowen, who has turned terrorist by bombing research labs. Linden and Cecily decide to help her and they start the trip back northward. However, with everything more in the open, things are also much more complicated and there is no hiding from Vaughn.

Vaughn is definitely the major antagonist of the series, but in this volume his character is greatly expanded and he becomes less two dimensional which leads into the development of what I see as the major theme of the series.

With this last book, the focus on the ethics of medical research really comes into focus. First, the basic premise of the book is that a generation of genetically modified humans led to a catastrophic malady. While it's initially referred to as a virus in the first two books, it becomes clear in Sever that it's a direct result of the genetic tinkering. The offspring of the modified generation have bodies that simply shut down and die on a consistent time clock.

As a result, medical research happens without the consent of the subjects they are ultimately trying to save. This desperation to fix them is at the core of Vaughn's character and many of his actions. The goal is seen to supersede the rights of the victims. Horrible and dangerous experimentation is conducted without oversight or precaution and at times without the subjects consent. This leads to the brand of terrorism that Rhine's twin is involved in.

So, ultimately this whole series plays with the idea of ends justifying means. In fixing a problem, how much is destroyed? As much as the book is about Rhine's story, the most interesting character to examine is Vaughn as his competing motivations and his effect on those around him come into focus.

I'm glad I stuck with the series.

Counting By 7's by Holly Goldberg Sloan

The first reading ladder I'm putting together is thematically organized around protagonist types. My first ladder all has protagonists with some form of learning disability. When I finish it, I'll blog it out for y'all. However, I have some gaps so I'm doing a lot of research and reading to find books that can fill it in. 

Counting by 7's was my first attempt. Willow Chance is 12, freakishly smart, and almost completely unconcerned with what teen-age culture says "fitting in" looks like. She is highly knowledgeable in botany, almost encyclopedic on medical knowledge, and learned vietnamese for fun. Willow is smart. She's probably meant to be autistic. She is also adopted, and, when her adoptive parents die in a horrific car crash, her world is turned upside down.

Willow has to navigate the world of California's Child Services. All she has going for her is her incredible intelligence, her friend Mai (who lends her her family), and a semi-competent school counselor named Del. Del, incidentally, is a woeful case of the blind leading the blind. 

Every character is flawed but well meaning and if it all falls together a little too easily, it is also a good quick read with some beautiful moments. There's some good contemplation on the meaning and nature of grief and on what 'family' really means. 

This is a good solid read for a precocious middle schooler. The reading level is solidly in the middle range but the ideas are pretty sophisticated. Thematically, I don't think it's a good fit for my LD ladder, but it's definitely worthy of inclusion on a ladder...maybe about coping with loss or cross cultural friendship.