Specials

The story is narrated in the close third-person perspective of Tally Youngblood, who prioritizes her own feelings and needs above those of others. In some ways, this echoes adolescent behavior, as Tally is 16 and transitioning from childhood to adulthood; thus, the novel can be read as a coming-of-age story. Tally’s arrogance prepares her to learn through the course of the novel to empathize with others and to assert her independence. In other ways, however, Tally literally is special, as her body has been enhanced and her mind has been manipulated by the machinations of the city-state in which she lives. Tally relishes these improvements, especially in the beginning: “She liked being special, being outside and icy and better” (6). The Uglies are immature and physically flawed, while the Pretties are beautiful but intellectually compromised. The Specials, by comparison, are vastly superior—at least according to Tally and the Cutters. This social engineering creates a City that stratifies its population based on surgically enhanced appearance and brain modification.

Nevertheless, it is clear from the beginning that Tally possesses a sense of her own individuality, though this sometimes fills her with shame. She agonizes over her past deeds and remains uncomfortable with the bond between the Specials: “Cutters touched one another all the time, but [Tally] wasn’t used to that part of being a Special” (10-11). Tally both desires and distances herself from that kind of belonging. In addition, Tally struggles between accepting her role as a Special and Cutter and acknowledging her own, often uncomfortable, thoughts and feelings. On the one hand, Tally thinks, “[O]beying wasn’t really that bad. It was icier than thinking, which could get you all tangled up” (26). On the other hand, Tally is the only one of the Crims who breaks through the lesions on her own: “[S]he’d managed to stop being a bubblehead all on her own—no nanos, no operation, not even cutting herself like Shay’s crew had” (58). This kind of autonomy makes Tally truly special, unlike anyone around her and thus lacking anyone to whom she could relate. Despite her acceptance within a social group, she is still emotionally isolated.

Tally references Shay’s practice of cutting (this is where the moniker Cutters comes from), and she herself indulges in self-harm on occasion. They believe that this practice grants them clarity of thought: “It was like when [Tally] cut herself, the pain building until she could hardly stand it anymore […] then suddenly flipping inside out. And hidden within the agony the strange clarity came again, as if the world had orders itself into something that made perfect sense” (44). It also becomes a way of demarcating themselves, setting themselves apart from others. Even within the Special Circumstances divisions, the Cutters are different. They are marked not only by tattoos, which are standard issue among Specials, but also by the scars that they inflict upon themselves. The practice distances them further from others and desensitizes them to pain, which enables them to be better, more ruthless enforces of the law.

In a broader scope, this world—set roughly 300 years from the present day—is made possible by technological advancement and political decentralization. The “Rusties” act as a stand-in for the readers, or members of contemporary real-world society, who were let “loose on the fragile world” and nearly destroyed it (58). All that is left of their civilization are hulking towers of rusted metal, hence the nickname. Tally’s City maintains its own independent government, as do Other Cities, with which they have little to no contact. These autonomous zones are made possible both by the employment of surveillance and surgical technology and by the fear that such technology might be used for destructive purposes. The Rusties serve as a warning to Tally’s city-states, and it underscores the tone of fear, suspicion, and isolation that defines the early sections of the novel.