By Declan Wasiljew, 13 years old

Summary:

In the Arc of a Scythe series we are introduced to a world where humanity has conquered death and is ruled over by a perfect, benevolent AI that has been leading humanity to a paradise. Additionally, in order to control the population scythes must now kill people as their job, with set requirements on who they glean. We meet Rowan and Citra who both meet a scythe and end up becoming his apprentice. However, at that time the scythedom is becoming corrupt and scythes that formerly held their just values about gleaning solemnly and respectfully now turn them into parties and are losing their morals. Rowan and Citra are both apprenticed to a respectful scythe, but when they go to the first conclave (a meeting of all of the scythes in a certain area) some of the “new-order” scythes decree that whoever does not become a scythe will be killed by the other. Unfortunately, right after the conclave their master mysteriously self gleans (when a scythe believes their time is over they kill themselves) and they are left alone. While Citra goes to Scythe Curie (an honorable and good scythe) Rowan gets stuck with the worst scythe of them all (Scythe Goddard). They must figure out what to do before one of them perishes…

What I liked and didn’t like:

I really liked how well the author made the characters. They really were relatable and great and I really liked The Thunderhead (the AI that rules the world). They did a great job of developing it and it had some really funny parts in the story. I also liked how there was a lot of content over three decent sized books, so I couldn’t just finish the whole thing in a few days. It took me at least a week to finish. I also liked how there was a lot of action that kept coming so there was never a boring spot. To be honest there wasn’t very much that I disliked. However, I thought that at certain points it got too complicated and there was a lot going on which made the story kind of hard to understand. Besides that, however, it was great.

Books it is similar to:

It is really similar to some other science fiction stories that have to do with complicated technology in the future. One good example of this is Unwind, as they both are written in a similar style. They also both talk about a sci-fi future world with a great story going on. Another story that is similar to it is Percy Jackson because of the characters. In both series they are really well developed and relatable and so if you like one you should read the other. For example in Percy Jackson we get to understand Percy really well and see his struggles which is exactly what happens in this book.

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