Review of Bumped by Megan McCafferty

~When a virus makes everyone over the age of eighteen infertile, would-be parents pay teen girls to conceive and give birth to their children, making teens the most prized members of society. Girls sport fake baby bumps and the school cafeteria stocks folic-acid-infused food.

Sixteen-year-old identical twins Melody and Harmony were separated at birth and have never met until the day Harmony shows up on Melody’s doorstep. Up to now, the twins have followed completely opposite paths. Melody has scored an enviable conception contract with a couple called the Jaydens. While they are searching for the perfect partner for Melody to bump with, she is fighting her attraction to her best friend, Zen, who is way too short for the job.

Harmony has spent her whole life in Goodside, a religious community, preparing to be a wife and mother. She believes her calling is to convince Melody that pregging for profit is a sin. But Harmony has secrets of her own that she is running from.

When Melody is finally matched with the world-famous, genetically flawless Jondoe, both girls’ lives are changed forever. A case of mistaken identity takes them on a journey neither could have ever imagined, one that makes Melody and Harmony realize they have so much more than just DNA in common.~

Does anyone remember Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield from the Sweet Valley High series? I certainly do (of course I am probably aging myself by saying that). I think Megan McCafferty remembers them as well because her set of twins in Bumped, Melody and Harmony, sure seem an awful lot like those two.

First off we have the annoying and snobby Jessica Melody.

Then we have the more down to Earth Elizabeth Harmony.

To make matters worse, a good chunk of the story reminds me of the Sweet Valley High novel where Elizabeth meets and kind of falls for some young celebrity guy.

I hate to say it, but it was horribad. The only reason I finished it was because it was one of the choices for my YA Summer Challenge. Most people on my friends list couldn't believe I forced myself all the way to the end. I could hardly believe it myself.

And of course this author is going to try to milk it. She gives it one of those horrible endings I hate and leaves so much more open that she hopes people will still come back to read the next 1-2 books, bad writing be damned.

It's hard enough to wrap my head around a story where girls (between the ages of 11-18 tops) are glamorized for having babies for adult couples who apparently no long can have their own due to some disease that hits you when you become an adult. But when the writing is THIS BAD and the characters are THIS DULL, well then it's just torture.

The one redeeming part of the whole book is the character Zen, who is Melody's best friend. He obviously wants to be more than friends with Melody, but she is saving herself so she can sell her "birthing years" off to the highest bidder. 

It's really sickening...

I'm glad I only bought it as an Ebook. I'd beat myself for paying that much for a hardcover of this trash.

I thought about ranking it a 1, but I didn't completely hate it, it did have a few good parts here and there, just not many of them. It really just rubbed me the wrong way a lot of times. But I'll most likely read the next one just to find out what happens after that dreaded cliffhanger...

My rating?

2 sulky scribble spiders out of 5.