Last time on TotallyNotTheGiver, their society/the Society killed her grandfather for being old.

Now, they’re discussing what to do with their free time the next Saturday. Another friend, Sera, says all the shows have been the same or two months, which is actually a lot more varied than I was expecting. Seems they still have some degree of creativity. Wonder why there’s new shows but not new anything else?

I’m sure Xander wants to go back to the game center, but I don’t. Our last excursion there didn’t end so well, what with my stepping on the tablets and having to meet with an Official.
Xander knows what I’m thinking. “It wasn’t your fault,” he says. “You weren’t the one who dropped them. It’s not as though they cited you or anything.”

She’s still uncomfortable, though, and would rather go to the show.

She explains that no one’s interested in music, which is just listening to the same recorded songs played quietly in a hall.

They decide to see the showing after all. “You know, that one about the Society? With all the aerial views?”

Suddenly, Ky is there. Apparently he hasn’t seen it yet. I wonder how many showings there at a time, and how long it takes to see all of them.

Cassia informs us that while this may be the first time she’s seen him in the flesh since last week, she’s spent the whole time picturing it in her mind. Arg.

Perhaps it’s because of what Grandfather said, at the end. By telling me it was all right to wonder. Somehow, though, I don’t think he meant Ky. I think it might be something bigger.

I concur. Let’s drop the love triangle and focus on the poetry and crushing monotony.

Another friend, Piper, wonders why he didn’t see it when it came out, and he says he must have been working late. Cassia says his voice is musical. Arg.

We all fall silent, as we always do when Ky talks about his work. We don’t know what to say to him when he mentions it. I know now that he probably wasn’t surprised with his assignment at the nutrition disposal center.

So from this, it seems like this also has a very unsocially-minded attitude toward some jobs, much like we do today. You’d really think they’d want to remove that from culture as fast as possible. Like the attitude about the outer provinces, it just doesn’t seem compatible with their whole sameness/equality thing.

Anyway, she compares him being an aberration and keeping that a secret all this time to her secret about her compact.

But the Society wants him to keep his secrets.

Actually, the impression I got was that it was more the society was keeping it a secret to protect him. I mean, sometimes this sort of thing is because the government doesn’t want people to know about how it’s unfair and evil, but mostly it’s because the people would be ostracized.

Anyway then she starts talking about how she never noticed his eyes before because she thought they were brown but actually they’re dark blue. Also apparently blue is the most common eye color in her province, so I guess these are the middle class American descendants of Scandinavians or something, butt his eyes are somehow different and yes book I get she has a crush on him can we move on already?

If he seems to have depth to me, do I seem shallow and transparent to him?

Ah yes, it’s not a YA romance without it being made clear that the love interest makes her feel bad about herself.

She imagines asking for a card about Ky since she doesn’t need her card about Xander.

He sees her grinning for no reason at this thought but doesn’t ask.

He doesn’t learn by asking questions. He is an Aberration from the Outer Provinces and yet he has managed to blend in here. He learns by watching.

Book.

I get that you are really in love with a character doing this. But people who are stealthy blendy-in people are not obvious about it. You decided to write this in first person and that means you’re limited to things Cassia can observe. If you wanted her to be full of insight about this, you should have established her as being naturally gifted at reading people and have it happen at other points than when staring at the designated love interest. Instead, you have portrayed her as someone who thinks her society is awesome and has had no reason to be suspicious of people.

While they wait for the movie, Xander asks if she’s okay.

“It’s not the tablets, is it? Is it your Grandfather?”
He knows me so well.

One of the things I’ve noticed is that it’s always Xander making these sorts of gestures. They seem to be both able to read each other, but the focus is on him reading her more than anything. I guess it’s because she’s the one with the secrets, but it’d be nice to have her doing the same at some points.

Xander waits, to see if I have more to say, but I don’t. I can’t tell Xander about Ky because Ky’s sitting right here next to me, I think, and I can’t tell Xander about the paper because this place is too crowded. These are the reasons I give myself for not confiding in Xander as I usually do.
They do not feel as true as they should.

What’s far more annoying is this almost fourth-wall-breaking introspection. It’s fine for a character to be lying to themselves, but it’s infuriating for a character to say they’re lying to themselves and yet not say what the truth is. Why doesn’t she want to tell Xander? Why hasn’t she wanted to tell Xander about everything else that happened? She doesn’t have to – it’s completely possible for there to be a real reason she’s uncomfortable with it. But it seems like it’s just happening because the author says so.

Ky comments about how it’s nice to spend time with the gang since he’s busy with work so often. Cassia says they’re his friends, and he repeats the word and she starts wondering about if he’s thinking of his outer province friends and it was seven years ago Cassia, you’re acting like he left last week.

Anyway, time for a history movie!

The cinematography is excellent; swooping low across the blue ocean, the green of the coast, over snow-crowned mountains, and on into the golden fields of the Farmlands, over the white dome of our very own City Hall (the audience cheers when it comes into view). Across more rolling green and gold toward another City, and another, and another.

Huh. Sounds like the ecosystem is functioning fine, so they really shouldn’t be having resource problems.

In each Province of the Society, people are likely cheering as they see their City—even if they have seen this showing before. When you see our Society like this, it’s hard not to feel proud.

So “the Society” is confirmed as just regular society that’s gotten a capital letter stuck on it somehow, presumably by whatever stupidity added capitals to the rest.

Even more interesting than the movie is people-watching – specifically, Ky watching. He looks awed by the view of the provinces.

We go through how things used to be before the Society came into being and before everything worked according to statistics and predictions.

…which was…?

And Ky goes back to blankface noreactionboy for all of this.

Then they show what pre-society life looked like, and apparently it’s something out of a post-apocalyptic western.

The scene is overdone. It’s ludicrous, especially after the quiet scene at Grandfather’s that I witnessed on Sunday. This isn’t what death looks like. One of the actors falls to the ground dramatically. Garish red bloodstains cover his clothing. I hear Xander give a little snort of laughter next to me, and I know that he feels the same way I do.

This is frustratingly ambiguous. She seems to be saying it’s a ridiculous amount of blood, which would be a normal criticism, but then she’s comparing the scene to her grandfather dying in bed as if she doesn’t get why blood would be involved at all. So it sounds like she’s just too sheltered to understand any other kind of death, except the previous chapter was all about how other kinds of death sucked and that’s why the quiet scene she’s talking about was proof their society was so awesome.

Anyway when she looks over to see Ky he’s crying silently. So I guess he’s got a traumatic backstory and this is reminding him of it. I would say that Ky reacting to the scene shouldn’t answer the question of if this looks accurate or not, because that’s not really how it works, but I don’t think the author’s considering that, so I guess we’re left with Cassia not knowing injured people bleed.

When the movie ends he’s back to pretending to be normal, and she doesn’t say anything and she can’t decide what to do, and then Ky’s gone before she can make up her mind.