Scythe By Neal Shusterman Book Review
“My greatest wish for humanity is not for peace or comfort or joy. It is that we all still die a little inside every time we witness the death of another. For only the pain of empathy will keep us human. There’s no version of God that can help us if we ever lose that.”
About
Author: Neal Shusterman
Genre: Dystopian Fantasy/Science Fiction
Series: Arc of a Scythe Book #1
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Synopsis
Thou shalt kill.
A world with no hunger, no disease, no war, no misery. Humanity has conquered all those things, and has even conquered death. Now scythes are the only ones who can end life—and they are commanded to do so, in order to keep the size of the population under control.
Citra and Rowan are chosen to apprentice to a scythe—a role that neither wants. These teens must master the “art” of taking life, knowing that the consequence of failure could mean losing their own.
Reviews
Spoilers Contained Below
To the Scythes,
Honestly, this is one of my favorite new series I’ve read this year!! I’ve heard nothing but good things about Scythe from everyone who’s ever read it and it wasn’t until I was watching Christine Riccio’s top ten reads of 2018 and saw that it was her #1 and I felt like, dang, I should read this book!
I absolutely loved the twisted, dark, but intriguing plot of this book where humanity has reached a time where there was no government, no disease, no racism, and no death, where people lived everyday and died by random choice by scythes. I liked the whole meaning behind the word choice in calling them scythes and not reapers or killers because killing is done out of malice intention, but scythes were weapons. And scythes were the weapons of society to glean others, not out of cold blood or enjoyment, but as a necessary act to keep the population in check. And I can’t fathom how hard a job that must be to kill people because you were chosen to do so and that it was your job. I feel like I could never do that and live with myself because I would feel burdened and guilty because human life is so precious and who would I be to take someone’s life.
The only way a scythe could die was if they took their own life. Because in this world people come back to life. People can literally jump off a building and “splat” and then they revive like life was a video game. Whenever people got a cut or felt pain or hurt, this advanced technology of nanities kicked in and repaired them to make them feel better. But everyone wasn’t all that invincible because fire was the one thing that couldn’t repair their nanities. However, there were these fire drones that would extinguish a fire immediately when alerted, but if a person were to burn in a building they wouldn’t be revived.
But what made me flabbergasted was the whole idea of people treating scythes like they were Gods themselves. In the beginning of the book, Citra’s mother greets Scythe Faraday like a casual acquaintance and then calls him “your honor,” and I was sitting there with my book in my lap, thinking is this man Judge Judy or something? Then she just invited him inside her home like she didn’t know that he was a killer coming to possibly glean one of their lives. And the audacity of Scythe Faraday to say that I have come for dinner!!! And he stayed and ate with them and they all were having a nice conversation with this looming sign of death just hanging over them and death himself was sitting with them eating dinner and they were all acting like nothing was happening 😧 Citra was the only one with good sense to not fall for all this and called him out on it.
Then he said he was just passing time to glean their neighbor! Like you went into their home, probably scaring the living daylights out of them, ate their food like it’s some sort of right, when all this time your intention was to glean their neighbor!
I swear.
Citra’s family knew the gleaning was going on next door and yet the only thing they did was turn the TV up louder so they didn’t hear anything. And to me, that just seemed so wrong to know a life is being taken next door and here you are watching TV on full blast, trying to ignore it. And I just, I can’t understand that. I would feel so guilty, so remorseful, and so sorry. But at the same time I do understand why they just sat there because Cirta and her family couldn’t do anything because that’s what scythes are supposed to do—-glean.
But the fact that Scythe Faraday goes back to their house with Citra’s family’s knife that he took, and returns it to them! I was like, no way Jose are they going to be using that gleaning weapon in their kitchen any time soon. Citra threw the gosh forsaken knife away. I also find it kind of dehumanizing how a person had to kiss the scythe’s ring to get immunity like how a person would bow to superior and beg for mercy. It’s kind of like, wow!
Then we meet Rowan, the lettuce, who feels like a neglected kid amongst a large family. The lettuce—not important— but still there and tolerable. And Rowan was there for Kohl when he was chosen to get gleaned when everyone else tried to avoid the Scythe and the gleaning. When people ran away, Rowan, bless his compassionate heart, wanted to be there for Kohl even though they weren’t close friends; no one deserved to be alone when they’re gleaned.
So Scythe Faraday chose Rowan and Citra to apprenticeship because he saw first hand their bravery, strength, and compassionate hearts. They were both taken from their homes to go live with Scythe Faraday to train after him where only one apprentice would become a Scythe by the 3rd conclave meeting. A conclave meeting is like a huge scythe meeting that happens three times a year for all scythes where they discuss issues and remember those they have gleaned.
It’s kind of obvious that Rowan and Citra would be the two in this book to fall in love. They were the main characters. But I didn’t feel that love love from them if you know what I mean; I just didn’t feel the love connection between the two. It just felt like they “loved” each other because they were in the same situation together and understood what each other were going through/feeling. It felt more like they loved each other because of circumstances rather than a natural feeling that you should just feel. I didn’t feel that natural spark to their love. Do I think that they would die for each other because they have a special friendship bond? Sure. Do I think they make a cute couple? Debatable. Doesn’t mean I didn’t like them individually or as friends, just not so much as a couple.
As much as I didn’t like them as a couple, I wouldn’t want to see any of them lose their lives. At the first conclave meeting, someone suggested that Rowan and Citra glean the one who doesn’t become a scythe and my heart fell and went splat! Like whoever suggested such an innate thing took a good situation and made it a game. I could not.
And as if my heart didn’t suffer enough pain, Scythe Faraday apparently gleaned himself by throwing himself in front of a bus! Like how the heck! 😨 It was beyond me because he seemed like such an honorable man. Yes, I get that his job was gruesome but if he really wanted to glean himself for his guilt, he would have done it eons ago rather than spontaneously right then and there. It didn’t seem right.
Then Xenocrates, the High Scythe, told Rowan and Citra that Scythe Faraday sacrificed himself was probably because he knew if he did so, the apprenticeship would be over and they wouldn’t need to glean each other. My gosh! He tried to save them because he felt like he failed them in the first conclave and now with the new rules hanging above their heads. Such a strong respect for Scythe Faraday despite what he does for a living.
What I also appreciated was the compassionate and merciful teaching style Scythe Faraday had compared to Scythe Curie and Goddard. Curie was all about quietness and unexpectedness like how death was in the Age of Mortality, while Goddard was all about flamboyance and frivolousness when it came to death—-everything had to be big and bold. And don’t even get me started on that man! I have such a strong dislike for him! SUCH a strong dislike!!
But let’s talk about Scythe Curie and Citra before I get into all the resentment and dislike I have for Goddard.
I saw Scythe Curie as a Grandma figure for Citra in teaching her the “old ways” and also cooking for Citra. She also knows Citra’s a powerhouse and has a mouth on her, but she puts her in place when need be, but is respectful of her most of the time. Like that one time Citra yelled at Scythe Curie in public about why she killed that man without mercy. Then Scythe Curie yells at her to get down to the ground and beg for forgiveness, causing this whole scene. And gosh, if I was Citra in that situation, I would have been shaking. But then on the car ride back from the market, Scythe Curie acted like nothing happened and she even answered Citra’s question later on at the house. Because Scythe Curie knew she had to reprimand Citra to uphold this image that no one should disrespect a scythe and I get that.
But I also liked how Scythe Curie handled things after the gleaning. I think she got her compassion from the person who used to be her mentor: Scythe Faraday. Which means that man is reeeeallllly old 🤪 I also admired how she would reach out to the family of those she gleaned, cooked them a meal, listened to their tales, and offered them immunity. It’s clear that she doesn’t like her job or the fame that she holds, but by opening up her home and arms to the families of those she took a life from, she allowed the family to find peace in such a difficult and hard situation. And she also allowed herself some peace in knowing that she was humane enough to still be there and empathize with them.
During the meal with the man Scythe Faraday first gleaned in front of Citra, she offered the family a knife to stab her in vengeance because she knew she would be revived later. But no one did. And they must have been so angry to have lost someone and here the scythe was offering them to do the same to her. And to me it just highlighted that yes, these people were angry and hurt, but they wouldn’t want to hurt another, not even the scythe itself because it would feel wrong. And it’s the same with real people. I think if we knew someone had taken someone we loved, we would feel that fiery anger and that pain to have retribution, but when it comes down to actually doing it, what makes us human is that we would never hurt another person as much as they hurt us. That compassion is what makes us us. And as much as we would like to hurt people who have hurt us, it will only end up hurting us with all the guilt and pain as well.
So I just really respected Scythe Curie. I even liked the fact that she told Citra to say sorry to that girl she killed when she pushed her in front of a bus. Citra literally knocked on this girl’s door and she was expecting to be gleaned, but instead she was offered a chance to push Citra in front of a bus like it’s such a casual thing people always knock on doors asking. Like knock knock. Want to push me in front of a bus? And this girl was like can I do it another time—like getting to push someone in front of a bus should be reserved for another time. I scoffed. Then she said can you take me out to lunch instead. Darkly weird.
Another part about Scythe Curie that I respected was her apprenticeship experience with Scythe Faraday. I liked how they fell in love and were executed to be punished. The whole story was oddly humane in how she had a crush on him and would act weird in front of him. She even went to his room on one occasion, so in his journal he wrote how he was scared she was going to kill him when really she had a massive crush. When he found out, he turned her down nicely until later when she was a scythe. That’s when he started to feel something else for her and they became something more.
The shock on both Rowan and Citra’s face when they figured out he was still alive was priceless. But hands down my favorite reaction was Citra’s in how she shot him because she thought he was Faraday’s killer, when Gerald was actually Scythe Faraday’s real name. I enjoyed their whole reunion and liked how Farady still cared about Citra and claimed that she was still his apprentice and to organize the poisons in his home.
As for Rowan, my gosh, he was trained to be a killer from Goddard.
Bless his soul.
Goddard is a brutal, heartless, savage and does his killings in masses. He takes what he wants and by an innumerable amount to have some sort of power. The whole scene where they go to the lab to glean a mass of people, was so inhuman and malicious and this was not the type of malicious scene I liked! Rowan was there trying to help people escape, bless his heart, while the others were gleaning. And it was so merciless and I couldn’t fathom how one could just do that for pleasure and feel some giddy high from that! Sick, that’s what Goddard was too, sick. But my mind was boggled at the end of this scene when Goddard goes outside and tells the escapees that he would grant them immunity. All the people rushed to kiss his ring as the lab burned behind them—-like Goddard and his apprentices didn’t just come and glean havoc on you guys earlier; It just seemed so wrong that they were so focused on getting immunity that the lives that were just gleaned didn’t seem to matter to them. And it just shocked me that they thought of Goddard as a merciful savior and a God for granting them immunity or “sparing them such a kindness” when he just gleaned a bunch of your co-workers and when he could have gleaned them..
And his apprentices were just as monstrous.
Except for Volta. He knew Goddard was a bad Scythe and he never liked his methods of gleaning, but he followed Goddard anyway because he felt an obligation to. The whole Tonist scene where Goddard rampaged and Volta had to glean all the school children was the hardest thing to read out of this whole book. There was one school kid who approached Volta with his Tonist fork and was like I believe I’ll be protected. And that broke me, as well as it did Volta because the kid had so much faith about a higher power. Yet, Volta gleaned them all. He couldn’t live with himself knowing he gleaned all those innocent kids, so he gleaned himself and asked Rowan to call him his real name and promised him to be better. Out of all the apprentices under Goddard, I highly enjoyed Volta and Rowan’s friendship because they brought each other back to earth when they felt malicious and they made each other want to keep fighting from within.
In anger and hurt, Rowan rages and decapitates and kills Goddard! And gosh, I was like YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! Goddard never deserved to be a scythe! Thank you Rowan for taking out the trash!
This might make me sound like a bad person but I was cheering when Rowan gleaned the other apprentices and burned that tonsil church to the ground. Ooops, sorry, but not really. Honestly, such a powerful scene. Or how he spoke to the firefighters with such bravado in telling them to not stop the fire but that they could stop the fire from spreading to other buildings. The firefighters were quaking and so was I! Goddard was burning like the pig he was!
Rowan really was made ruthless. But it was a good kind of ruthless.
Then Xenocrates went to visit Rowan after Goddard burned down and asked him how he was the only one who survived the fire. But Rowan just told him to take Esme home because we all know she was his secret baby child! I just knew it! At first, I thought Esme was Goddard’s daughter and that’s why she was special and shouldn’t be gleaned, but then at the pool party, Xenocrates obliged to Goddard’ insane requests and that made me wonder why Goddard could get away with such things or why he had the upper hand. And then it clicked! He knew about the secret love child! And Goddard had to listen to him to protect his daughter.
So Xenocrates went through lengths to protect her. He even accused Citra of Faradays’s murder with the journal entry from Scythe Faraday that was written about Scythe Curie all those years ago. But during that scene, Citra was so kick butt in jumping out the window after fighting off the guards. Honey girl went splat! 🤪 And I was like what are you doing? But Citra’s much smarter than anyone gives her credit for because she knew if she went spat, it would buy her time and she wouldn’t be in scythe hands, but in the Thunderheads control.
And let’s talk about this big ominous Thunderhead. I liked how it’s a play on the Cloud we have now. But the Thunderhead was better. It’s this thundering, body of knowledge, with eyes, ears, and control on everything. And it can talk! What I’m ingraining is just a gigantic gray cloud talking and it’s soooo weird. But it can speak to people in that in between space between life and death. The Thunderheadtalked to Citra and hinted to her that she was going to be a big part of something that will change the Scythedom. Foreshadowing much? Get it, cause it’s a cloud, excuse me, where’s my manners, it’s a “Thunderhead.” 😉
But I liked how Scythe Curie protected Citra once she was better. I liked the whole moment when Scythe Curie confronted the Scythe who came to track Citra. The Scythe was secretly honored and excited to meet the Madam of Death, but he also knew he has to do his job. Then Scythe Curie blew up both his cars and was like, “Now you have to stay for dinner.” I swear there’s something about scythes and dinner 😂.
But the moment before the last conclave event really got me. It was the defining moment of who would be named a scythe and all the apprentices had to go in for their last test. When Citra went into the testing room that day, she saw her younger brother Ben, and I can’t tell you how hard my heart fell in my chest!!! I was SCREAMING and SHAKING my head like a wet dog, saying NO NO NO NO NO! 😳
NO!
And it finally clicked for Citra and for me that the worst thing she would ever have to do was glean someone she loved—-her brother. And my heart broke for Citra and the maturity and understanding of Ben who didn’t seem fazed that his sister was literally going to stab him. He was asking her if it would hurt, would he get ice cream after this, and could he touch the knife. And Citra and him knew he would be revived, but the act itself would be something both of them will remember and for Citra that was worse than anything because who knew if he would ever forgive her for that. But he would 💓. He was so trusting of her and knew that that was what she had to do. I was crying when she was trying to console him and then she trusted the knife into him and that PAINED ME as much as it pained Citra. I couldn’t ever kill someone I loved even if I still knew they would heal from that. I would never mentally heal from that.
In the end, Citra was chosen as the Scythe and we all knew it. . or well, I felt it. She seemed like she deserved it more than Rowan who always botched the conclave testings so that Citra would win. He never had the drive to want to win over Citra because he cared for her too much. But let’s take a moment to appreciate Citra’s chosen scythe name because it was just genuinely perfect for what she stood for. She chose the name Scythe Anastasia because Anastasia did nothing profound because she was a product of a corrupt system that denied her very life. What a revolutionary! And I liked how Rowan was like I respected her even more.
But then came the dreaded moment where she had to glean him. And I couldn’t comprehend how she could just glean someone she genuinely cared for—-this time with no revival. But I underestimated Citra because she punched him with her ring and got Rowan’s blood DNA, which granted him immunity. Clever girl!! I feel like when Rowan’s immunity is up, people will hunt him down, but time is time and thank Citra for thinking so sneakily.
Then everything fell into chaos as Rowan tried to run and save himself and he does so with all the agility and speed he’s been taught by Goddard. I guess that’s one good thing that came from that man. And that’s when he went to the car Citra planned to help him escape and he see’s Faraday at the end.
I was unsatisfied 😰! Everything just stopped so soon. But then there was this little tidbit about a Scythe Lucifer burning buildings down and I was like, woah, hold up! Rowan the fallen angel of the scythdom is burning it up as a vigilante. Who would have thought!
Honestly, I’m excited to read the next book and to see how the story line progresses with the new scythe way and the old scythe way. Because we know that there might be a battle between the scythes because they’re divided in their methods, but as to Citra and Rowan’s roles in the whole thing, I don’t know. But I’m eager to know. I hope we get my Scythe Faraday and Scythe Curie scenes and maybe even reignite that spark 😉. Or I hope we get to understand more about Xenocrates and Esme and how that came to be. Or what happened to Esme after Xenocrates took her home.
What were your thoughts on the book? What was your favorite or least favorite moment? Do you see Rowan and Citra as a good couple or just friends? If you had the choice to be a scythe, would you? Let me know below in the comments as I love hearing from you all 💕
And even though this book was very dark and a heavy topic, by no means am I a malicious or horrible person for finding this topic of the book interesting. I just think the whole idea of scythes and a time like this is fascinating but something that I wouldn’t want to see happening. I could see how maybe one day the world might reach a point where there are no diseases or death, but I think gleaning each other is something no one should have to endure.
With that said, always live life to the best that you can everyday because you never know when it might be your last. And that’s such a sad thought, but it’s the truth. So whatever brings you joy (with good intentions), I hope you do more of that. And whatever brings you pain or sadness, I hope you have the strength to get through it or to remove yourself from that situation that makes you feel bad. It’s your life at the end of the day and your happiness that matter most.
Choose happiness and I hope you have a bright and beautiful day whenever and wherever you might be reading this.
And as always, with love,
Rating
4.89 Full Bloom Flowers
Characters: I loved Citra and Rowan individually, but again, not so much as a couple. I think they make each other stronger and to want to be better people. They both have strong, compassionate hearts as well.
Plot: Such a fascinating plot that makes you ponder life and death and what it means to be human.
Writing: Love the writing style with each chapter that started with a diary entry from one of the scythes. It really gives you some insight into what they’re thinking or how they felt.
Romance: I think sometimes two people can be just friends and that’s just fine.
Action: I wouldn’t say there’s a lot of fighting, more gleaning. But all those scenes will leave you kind of surprised and on your toes thinking about how the scythes might be feeling in the moment, whether it be pain, remorse, or in Goddard’s insane case, joy.