Customer Reviews

The Secret Under My Skin

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
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It's always a shock when you find what you've believed since you were young is not what everyone else in your community believes to be true. Blay Raytee can't remember her parents or where she was from. She was placed in a government-run orphan work camp where they learn how technology users are evil and have to die in order for prosperity to return to the earth. She is afraid to go outside without a protective radiation suit. Things all change when she is chosen by the "bio-indicator" to be her assistant as she prepares for her trials. Blay begins to learn how different the world is from what she was taught in the work camp. She is drawn into a secret world as well as learns how to love for the first time. She also grows to understand her own value and her own hidden secrets. If you like "The Giver" by Lois Lowry, then you should enjoy this book.

Really good science fiction for teenagers is rare. It tends to be based on idiot science and have a subliminal message that the only important thing in life is family.

Janet McNaughton's The Secret Under My Skin falls into neither trap. Set in the far future, on an ecologically degraded earth, the politics are scary and the heroes real people. No soppy earth mothers, no great destinies, just hard work and human ingenuity. I loved this book.

Set in the far future in a world wrecked by exploitation, there is no airy fairy mysticism, just sensible plotting and an attempt to get to grips with scientific and technological possibilities in poor circumstances.

Well written and really compelling characters.

Imagine yourself in the near future. You don't know where your parents are, or who you truly are. If you can picture that, you can picture Blay Raytree's story. The story begins with Blay in practically a sweatshop-orphanage in the year 2368. She ggets picked out of all of the other orphans to assist a bio-indicator. While she is in the house he bio-indicator is living in, she realizes something. Whenever she runs her wrist near the kitchen scanner, it beeps. Blay asks a friend, Lem Howell, an electronics genius, to help her. They find out it is an information chip with her age (sixteen years od), real name (Which is Blake Raintree), and other important information. In return, Blake helps Lem Howell and his son, Fraser. After Lem's wife was kidnapped by the Commission, Lem went insane and was unable to care for his son, so the town took up that duty. However, when Lem recovers his sanity, he can remember everything but the birth of his son. Blake helps to reunite them, and they then decide to live together.
Blake then realizes that Marella, the bio-indicator, has to go on a task by herself, which means she wouldn't be able to use Blake's special knowledge. Because Blake worried about what would happen if Marella failed the last test. Blake runs to the Masterr and tells him everything that she has dne for Marella to help her to complete the tasks. Instead of being scolded or punished like she expected, she was praised for her knowledge and love for all things Science. After that, the book begins to wind down, and it shows the world healing from the Technocaust, the very war that caused so many children to be parentless and not know who they were, or where they came from.
I give this book five stars and two thumbs p, because Janet McNaughton did a wonderful job weaving a story about the future into things that have happened in the past (the Holocaust, Hitler's invasion, most of World War II, just in a different year, and on a greater scale of damage).She obviously scrutinized over the amount of detail that wat put into it. Anyone who is into science-fiction books, books about what could happen in the future due to the way humans are behaving in the present, or just want a good, heartrending book that you can cuddle up with, then this book is awesome. I would recommend it to people ages fourteen to sixty.

*C.S. Larochelle

The Secret Under My Skin
Janet McNaughton

Blay is chosen to help a bio- indicator accomplish a special task. As she begins helping, she also uncovers keys to both the healing power of the world and to her past.
In the year 2368, confusion and fear rule the Earth. In this world, everyone is under strict government control. Blay Raytee, a government work camp orphan, is no exception. She is told the same lies the government tells everyone. However just when she starts believing that she will live out the rest of her life in a work camp, she is saved. As she helps Marella, the bio- indicator accomplish her tests, she also learns more about herself with help from her new friends. For one thing, her name isn't Blay, but Blake Raintree. Her friend, Lem Howell, also finds out who her mother was and was able to locate one of her friends that is still alive. In return, Blake helps Lem and his son, Fraser, out. After Fraser's mom was taken away by the Commission, Lem went into a mental state. He was not able to take care of his son, so the town took care of him. However when Lem recovered, he could remember everything about what had happened except the birth of his son. Therefore, in return for all the help Lem has done for her, Blake reunites the two and they finally move in together. Blake also learns that she has made a mistake. She has allowed Marella to abuse her gift. Blake was giving her all the answers to her tests because Marella really didn't know them. Luckily, she hears what is planned for Marella and knows that it should be her doing that, so she finally gives in and tells. Instead of being punished, Blake is praised for having the gift of loving science. All is well in Blake's world, and the healing of the world has also begun. This was a good book and a good look into the future.
The author tries to use terms in the book like some of the terms associated with World War II. During the Holocaust, millions of Jews were killed, and in this book, the author calls the time when thousands of techies were killed the Technocaust. The book also refers to places where the techies where taken to after being captured as concentration camps. In the book, there is not a president or a king, but a Commission, who wants to have total power over the people, just like Hitler. Another way this book used events from WWII was when they explained how the Commission took over. Hitler took over because Germany was politically unstable after the First World War In The Secret Under My Skin, the Commission was able to take over because the governments couldn't cope with the effects of global warming. They tried to cope with floods, forest fires, hurricanes, ice storms, and the droughts and famines, but they couldn't and so they allowed themselves to be controlled by the Commission.
This book gives us a look into the future. It tells of what global warming could do to the environment and the effects it could cause to future generations. It also shines light on what could happen after the storms, when the whole world is in a state of emergency. By foreseeing what could come of this world, it also shines light on the world's past. The same types of things are happening repeatedly. Many of the things that happened in WWII happened during the Technocaust, and like in the Cold War, there is tension, brewing for war between the Commission and the Way.
This book also gives good guesses to what technological advances we could have in the future. Blake had a microchip in her arm. It told her what her name was, where she was born and her birthday. Blake also had a panel in her room, on her wall that she could set. It was like an alarm clock, radio, television and thermostat all in one. The house also had many panels throughout it that did various things such as turn the lights off and tell them when the food was running low. There are also things called last books that you have to pot into things called biblio-techs, so that you can read them.
The Secret Under My Skin was a great book. When reading you can experience how the world might be like in 2368, with all of its technological advancements. That world was not great at all, but at least we know that if the world ever did get that bad, there will still be people out there who want to make the world better and actually take a stand.

S.Gore

Blay Raytee wants to find her identity. When she gets the chance she takes it. She looks into her past and finds horrible things that happened to many citizens of Toronto her home city. The Technocaust was the cause of all this and she wants to do something about it. She meets an old man who finds out her identity and the rest goes on from there. This book was an amazing look into the future and told me about differences. This book is the all-time best book ever!

The Secret Under My Skin. Hits the point.
It will make you think about life and world. Are really going to end up that way? Are really that un-caring to the world?
This girl was scared and different. Was she really that way because of something the world did a generation or two ago?

This book is in the future. One girl must help another.
She must find out what happened to her parents.
And above all else she must tell the truth in a world of lies.