The writing itself was not bad, the storyline and the characters on the other hand

An excellent sequel to Matched. Happiness and tears abound. This book didn't pull punches with breaking my heart a couple of times, but also made me happy to. The ending was well set up to make me impatient to read the next book. Thankfully, it is out and I won't wait long.

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Sometimes an author should stop at one. The Matched series has gone progressively downhill and Reached is by far the worst of the three. Overlong and disjointed, the three points-of-view are supposed to flesh out Xander but only serve to take pull focus off the few interesting ideas. 

Once again, Cassia is separated from Ky and must choose between the best friend she's always loved and the mysterious Aberration she's in love with. Xander has infiltrated the Society as a member of the Rising administrating special anti-Society vaccines and curing a plague the Society accidentally started. Ky's still working as a pilot, delivering the cure to the cities, and Cassia's sorting and bringing art and poetry back to the masses. 

Until the three meet back up, more than halfway though the book, it's painfully dull and Cassia especially has to be unbelievably stupid for the plot to work. She continually trusts people she doesn't know, doesn't question obvious inconsistencies in the Rising, and really does nothing but twiddle her thumbs while the men cure a pandemic. Xander also ignores the fact that the Rising is really, obviously crooked, but since we've barely seen him since the trilogy started, maybe he was always tragically naive. Ky continues to be suspicious of everyone, thus proving he's the only one with the sense God gave a mouse. Of course, he continues to go along with everything, so let's not get crazy. 

Fortunately, they do all meet up and travel outside the society to Endstone, the last village in a string leading to the Otherlands. Their work on the plague in the village is the only redeeming factor to the book. Several interesting new characters with complex emotions and desires are introduced, which only serve as a counter to how flat the main characters have become.

If we worked hard, cured the plague, and lived happily ever after, I might even bump the score up. But no, we then have a hundred pages to wrap up the love triangle. I don't mind love triangles nearly as much as some other reviewers, but this one is painful. The choice has been clear for 3 books, no matter how many times Cassia says she loves him but..., so the author attempts to give the loser his own happy ending. It involves, despite just losing the self-proclaimed love of his life, the guy hooking up with a dead character's girlfriend in an end that's basically, 

"I loved a man, but he died." 
"I love another girl who loves someone else." 
"..."
"..."
"Soul mates?"
"Cool, let me just send a letter to Cassia telling her I've TOTALLY moved on."

Despite saying this is the end, the book is definitely left open for more stories in the world. Ky's family is still missing, there's a lot left open in the society, and we still haven't seen the Enemy or the Otherlands. If she does decide to revisit the world, I hope she abandons these characters because they have nothing left to say.

Actual rating: 3.5The Story: I felt like Reached answered all my questions from the prior books and created a new obstacle to be overcome. I found the pacing to be rather slow and actually felt a bit bogged down around the middle of the book. Honestly, I did not reread Matched or Crossed again before reading this and I found myself lost in certain parts and I had forgotten a couple of the characters completely, but it didn't take too long for me to get back into the story.The Characters:Reached added some new characters and delved into some of the cast more thoroughly. For the first time we got to see Xander's POV which I enjoyed. Overall though, I wanted more interactions between Cassia, Ky and Xander. Each spent the majority of the book on their own journey so I really missed the dynamics between Cassia and Ky and Cassia and Xander.Final Thoughts: I felt like Reached concluded the series well in that we got closure and questions where answered. Sadly though, I was underwhelmed with the some of the book but if you've read the other two you shouldn't miss this conclusion.Review is also on my blog My Friends Are Fiction

(2.5 stars)This is the second book in this series, following Matched, which I read last year and enjoyed. Be warned that there may be spoilers for Matched. Here is the summary from Goodreads: Cassia and Ky both narrate their quests crossing the ochre mountainous Carving to reach their love. She seeks the resistance, The Rising led by the Pilot, but does he? New teen friends red-haired Indie, fishing Vic, and chatty Eli, join them. Nothing is as expected on the edge of Society, where crosses and double crosses make the path more twisted than ever.Oh boy, I really struggled to get into this book, and that’s probably because it’s been a long time since I read Matched and really needed to refresh my memory on what happened at the end of that book! I always do that with any series I start to read, and I’m trying to get better at working my way through a series.However, once I figured that out, I somewhat enjoyed this book. Although I found it a bit slow-moving, I liked that Ky and Cassia were out of the Society’s clutches (for the time being, at least), trying to find each other and survive on their own.I did feel that this book suffered from ‘book two’ syndrome, because there was some plot advancement, but I felt like the author was holding back and clearly setting up for a larger conflict in the final book. That’s all well and good when it’s done well, but this book felt like a place-holder, like it existed just to bridge the gap between a first and third book.I liked the development of Cassia and Ky’s romance (which surprised me, given how much I usually complain about romance!), and the way they struggled with wanting to take a different path – would they make choices based on their beliefs, or based on wanting to stay together? I also liked the characters that were introduced, especially Indie. I hope I get to read more about her in the next book, and she certainly makes the love triangle (square?) more interesting.Speaking of that love triangle…since Xander was absent for the majority of this book, it wasn’t actually that much of an issue. However, towards the end, Cassia begins to think about him some more, and compare and contrast the two boys. Sigh. I just don’t care that much about the love triangle in this book – I don’t care who she ends up with! I understand what it means to have had Xander ‘chosen’ for her by the Society, and that having Ky’s face appear instead threw a wrench into everything and led Cassia down the path she’s on now, but I think they’re both good guys, they both love her, and I can see why she would be attracted to each of them. So for once, I don’t have a preference regarding the love interest, but I’m not really looking forward to reading the next book if it’s all about Cassia struggling to choose between Ky and Xander.The story was narrated alternately by Ky and by Cassia, but I really couldn’t feel any difference in either of their narrative voices. Honestly, sometimes I had to go back to the start of the chapter and look at the heading, to double check which one was narrating. It just felt like the same voice throughout the book.I never really got much sense of danger from this book. Once the story picked up and they were making their way to the Carving, I never worried for Ky and Cassia’s safety. They were in danger from nature/the elements, which was definitely interesting, but I never really felt that the Society posed much of a threat to them in this book, and so I didn’t feel any real sense of urgency.Oh gosh, I can’t forget to mention that Xander’s big secret that was hinted at throughout the book really did surprise me! I actually didn’t see it coming, and that’s one plot aspect I’m looking forward to reading about more in the next book.So yes, although I really didn’t love this book and was really frustrated with the fact that Cassia and Ky’s narrative voices seemed identical to me, and that not much seemed to happen (I really think it could have been like 100 pages shorter), I will be reading the next and final book in the series, Reached.(From www.pingwings.ca)