Wither
Wither (the Chemical Garden #1) Author: Lauren DeStefano Reviewed By: Courtney Published By: Simon & Schuster Release Date: 2011 Genre: YA/ Dystopia Pages: 358 pages Thanks to modern science, every newborn has become a ticking time bomb-males only live to age 25, and females only live to age 20. In this bleak landscape, young girls are kidnapped and forced into polygamous marriages to keep the population from dying out. When sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery is taken by the Gatherers to become a bride, she enters a world of wealth and privilege. Despite her husband Linden's genuine love for her, and a tenuous trust among her sister wives, Rhine has one purpose: to escape-to find her twin brother and go home. But Rhine has more to contend with than losing her freedom. Linden's eccentric father is bent on finding an antidote to the genetic virus that is getting closer to taking his son, even if it means collecting corpses in order to test his experiments. With th...