I would have given this book two or three stars, at most, if the ending wasn't as amazing. If you've read her "Matched" series, you need to read this book. Seriously. It's a must. I'm not going to spoil anything in this review, but Condie is brilliant and the ending of this book was absolutely amazing.

I finished "The Last Voyage of Poe Blythe" behind the library circulation desk where I work. I had to close the book, close my eyes, and try to slow my heart rate when the connection was made (you'll understand when you read it). My mind was blown to shreds.

That being said, there were a lot of things I would change about this book. The first half of the book was incredibly boring. I was hooked by Call's loss and what it did to Poe. After that, Condie lost me. I would've stopped reading if I didn't love Condie so much. I wanted to continue reading for the sake of the author, not the story.

Turns out, the story line was incredible... just super slow. It really picks up a little over half-way through the book. From that point, it has consistent action and develops the page-turning nature that we readers crave in a book. You just have to get past the first half of the book. As a writer, I know that the first bit is supposed to show you what the "day-in-the-life" looks like for the characters. Condie took that a little too far, in my opinion.

However, I can definitely see Condie's maturity as a writer flourish compared to the "Matched" series. Great books, definitely recommend them, but "The Last Voyage of Poe Blythe" was better written. Plotting could've been designed better (as mentioned), but the writing itself was superb.

Okay, so let's talk the first half of the book. The characterization was overemphasized. We understand the Brig is strong, Poe has severe trust issues, Naomi is stoic, and Tam is young and eager. We get all of that. The emphasis makes sense because you see the characters change, as we should, through the book... but, we didn't need that much guidance to come to those conclusions. We could see through character's actions; we didn't need to be told what the characters were like.

All of that being said, I was going to give this a two-star review... until things sped up. It earned its third star for the middle-to-end-of-the-book plotting and the fourth star for the connectivity to the "Matched" series.

I am an Ally Condie fan and look forward to her next release.