Enclave by Ann Aguirre

259 pages

"In Deuce's world, an enclave deep underground, people earn the right to a name only if they survive their first fifteen years. By that point each unnamed 'brat' has trained to join one of three groups - Breeders, Builders, or Hunters, identifiable by the number of scars they bear on their arms. Deuce has wanted to be a Huntress for as long as she can remember.

As a Huntress, her purpose is clear - to brave the dangerous tunnels outside the enclave and bring back meat to feed the group while evading the ferocious monsters known as Freaks. She's worked toward this goal her whole life, and nothing's going to stop her, not even a brooding Hunter named Fade. When the mysterious boy becomes her partner, Deuce's troubles are just beginning.

Fade doesn't like following orders. Deuce has never known a boy like him before, someone as likely to touch her gently as use his knives with feral grace.

As Deuce's perception shifts, so does the balance in the battle for survival. The mindless Freaks, once considered a threat due to their sheer numbers, now show signs of cunning and even strategy...but the elders refuse to heed any warnings. No matter how hard she tries, Deuce cannot stem the dark tide that carries her far from the only world she's ever known." -Dust Jacket

*SPOILERS*

This is a pretty short book and before I started I wondered how much story could really be told in those 259 pages, but I was pleasantly surprised. Ann Aguirre's dystopian world is gritty, dangerous, and sort of a Darwinian world, where the fit survive and the weak die. She dives right into the story with Deuce's naming ceremony. Names are picked by putting items on the ground and then cutting the person's hand. Whatever item the person's blood drops on becomes their name and they keep that item. It becomes sort of a sentimental thing for the person to hold onto.

The enclave is located in New York's subway system. Most of its members have never been above ground or even left the enclave. It has survived because it weeds out the weak. The elders (in their 20's) keep order and make the rules. Hoarding is not allowed. In fact, punishment for being caught with something is banishment. Members must bring anything they find from the outside world to the Wordkeeper, a historian of sorts. By the end, there's evidence that the elders know more about the outside world then they've let on.

Deuce is banished about midway through for speaking up for a friend. She knows he is being framed so the elders can make an example of him, an annual reminder to the people of what happens if you break the rules. Fade, her hunting partner and friend, goes with her. Above ground she faces a world that's completely foreign to her. She's never been exposed to the sun and Fade, who grew up above ground, has to teach her words for various things. Fade is a great character, much like Four in Divergent. You learn more about him as the story unfolds, but in the beginning all you know is that he's an outsider who's been taken in by the enclave and allowed to become a Hunter. (By the end you know that the choice they gave him was either fight for them or die.) The enclave keeps him at a distance and Deuce thinks that she's being punished when she's made his hunting partner. She quickly learns that allow he appears hard to like, he's brave and respects Deuce and her abilities.

Deuce is pretty clueless emotionally. She hasn't grown up with affection or knowing what love is so she has a hard time figuring out how she feels about Fade, and how he feels about her. She has an even harder time realizing how a new relationship with Stalker affects Fade. Stalker is a scary guy when you first meet him but you soon realize that he's just a guy who's had to adapt to a violent world of his own, basically a kill or be killed type place. He winds up leaving the city and traveling with Fade, Deuce and Tegan, a girl Deuce rescued from Stalker's gang, which creates an interesting dynamic since they are forced together. You hate Stalker at first and then you sort of like him. I'm sure that's the beginning of the ever-present love triangle. (I'm Team Fade.)

The Freaks are scary, especially when they start showing signs of thought and strategy. They are mean and they are everywhere.

The book leaves Deuce and her group seemingly safe in an aboveground city with the fate of the enclave unknown. Deuce fears they may have all been killed by Freaks, but I have a feeling that some of them at least have survived, maybe even come above ground. I loved the names the author uses for her characters: Deuce, Fade, Thimble, Stone, Stalker, Tegan, Silk, Copper, to name a few. Of course this book will have a sequel...in the fall of 2012!