Bogus to Bubbly: An Insider's Guide to the World of Uglies (The Uglies)

To be perfectly honest, I wish I hadn't gotten this book. It might be more worth-reading if I was more interested in technology (which was basically what the whole thing was about), but in actuality I thought it was extremely long-winded for such a little book. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone not

Show More

extremely into sci-fi. Also, I got the impression more than once that Scott Westerfeld was a woman. I don't know why, but it definitely seemed that way.

P.S. : Don't let this sway anyone from the Uglies series. Those books were really good.

Show Less

This was a cool insite into the author's mind. I liked reading about how he got some of the ideas, also he pointed out things I didn't quite catch while reading the series, so I'm glad I read this book. But once is enough.

One of my all time favorite series is Scott Westerfeld's "Uglies". I was so thrilled that I bought a set for our morning school book club. I am now down to four books because students have loved them so much they have kept them. In Bogus to Bubbly, Westerfeld answers all of those questions we had

Show More

as we read the series. How did he come up with the names and the slang words he used in his books? How did he create the science based items in his book and what are the chances that we will see them in the future. All of these questions and more are answered in this book. It is a definite for anyone who loves the "Uglies" series.

Show Less

This book helps to understand all the other ugly books. There are puictures that help ease the reading too!

A companion volume to the Uglies series, this is a fun insight into the creation of the world and the people in it.

This isn’t exactly a review. Scott Westerfeld has written a series called “The Uglies Series” it seemed to have started as a trilogy, but ended up with 4 books (please don’t make me spell that). This book is like a cheat sheet, a reference book to the series. A book to have handy while

Show More

you’re reading the series, since a dictionary won’t help.

Scott Westerfeld tells us where he got the idea for the book (HAH! You’ll understand if you read it.) and where he came up with some of the terms and the ‘language’ he uses in the book. Be warned, if you read it before you read any of the books, there may be some things in there that could be considered spoilers. However if you are reading the books and getting totally confused, this book will clear up a lot of the confusion.

I checked this series out of the library. I have been reading books that took forever to get through and wanted something I could just burn through without being mind numbing. I read the first two yesterday. I think they’ll do the trick.

Show Less

Just some koool background information. No help in using the text for discussion. Ah well.

So far, I've enjoyed hearing the real-life story that inspired Westerfeld's idea for the novel, but I could have, had I searched it out, found that on the internet. I've never read an "insider's guide" to a book or book series before and had always wondered what the heck they are. So I'm trying it

Show More

out. I wonder if I'd have liked this more as a teen. I guess I'm supposed to pretend that I AM a character in Westerfield's utopia, and if I were, here is the handbook for operating the hoverboards. Here's a map of Prettyland. Here is a more in-depth summary of the rules, and the history, etc.

Update: I actually liked this! There's a section that gets way too scientific for me about the science behind the sci-fi (it gave me a headache) but there's also a lot of literary analysis & introspection on Westerfeld's part that would satisfy any lit major, except that it may give away a bit too much. But since his audience isn't college English majors, it should be okay.

In this guide, you can learn more about Westerfeld's fictional society as if it were real, find out the "why" behind many of the choices he made (character's names, plot elements, last lines of the books, etc.), find out which sci-fi elements are actually possible or in existance today, what he hoped readers would take away from the book, and even learn how to create your own slang via the rules he followed in making his. His super-fan club would enjoy seeing drafts of Extras, and I enjoyed not having to read Extras because he summarizes the plot & presents an in-depth analysis of its themes, so I don't have to read it. Yay! All was resolved for me at the end of Specials, anyway.

Who would I recommend this to? It would only be to students who not only read the entire series, but kids who DEVOURED it and never struggled with comprehension, because the reading is actually more complex in this guide than the novels themselves. I don't think he pared down his vocabulary at all, and wrote like he was talking to peers, not kids.

Show Less

When I heard that Scott Westerfield had put together a companion volume to his Uglies series, I was stoked. I love me a good companion volume. I logged onto the library's website and put in a request for it straight away.

And I'll tell you, the book is just as fun as it sounds. It's evidently geared

Show More

at younger Uglies fans, (which does make sense, this being a YA series and all), but there's enough good stuff here that older fans will learn something, too. Westerfield includes a hoverboard manual, maps, (maps!!!!), a history of Tally's world, a guide to life phases in the Prettytime, notes on all the cliques, information on the science that went into the series, notes on the language Tally and her friends use, a glossary, and some other miscellaneous goodness.

Personally, I got the most out of the science stuff. I'm sure you science types will find it overly simplistic, but my artistic little self thought Westerfield did a great job of putting everyting into layman's terms. He writes about where the technology in Tally's world comes from. Some things, like nanos, are time-honoured sci fi traditions. Others, like the self-heating food packets, are real, while skintennas and the like are Westerfeld's own invention. Perhaps the most interesting chapter, though, deals with the science of beauty. Westerfeld describes the various theories that went into the Prettytime. It's fascinating stuff.

If you enjoyed the Uglies series, I'm sure you'll get a kick out of this book. It's a fast, fun read.

(This review originally appeared on my blog, Stella Matutina).

Show Less