THE PLEDGE - Kimberly Derting

The reason for me to choose THE PLEDGE as my first post is undeniably the special setting of the story. It is a book categorized under the Science fiction, or more specifically, dystopian section. The plot of the story revolves around the protagonist Charlaina “Charlie”, who lives in a country, Ludiana. It is a country ruled by a cruel monarchy and is strictly stratified by a caste system divided by language. (The power of speech!) It has three caste in the system, and each speaks its specific language.

Englaise is the universal language used by everyone, or rather the only language for the serving class, Parshon for the vendor or middle class, and Termani for the upper class citizens. The citizens of each class are only suppose to know Englaise and their own language, while the others are not permitted to understand. When citizens in a higher rank speak in their specific language, one is suppose to keep your eyes on the floor and show respect. The smallest transgression, such as looking at the eyes of people talking to you when they speaks in their language, results in immediate death. Such cruel and strict caste system of course, comes with a history or war, just like every dystopian story does.

Many years ago, there was a rebellion upon the monarchy (The Revolution of Sovereigns), and when they successfully overthrown the queen, Ludiana became a republic country. The Senate that time brutally executed every royal blood available, and that almost caused the entire royal bloodline to extinct. Fortunately, some went into hidings and disguise themselves as the normal citizens, and they stayed that way since then. However, no longer after the rebellion, the queen managed to seize the throne back and set the caste system in order to reduce the interaction between people, preventing rebellion to happen again. 

The book is predominantly first person’s narration (Charlie’s point of view), but in between chapters there are also second person’s narration for the other characters like Max, the Queen, and Xander. Charlie is a vendor’s daughter who helps her parents in their restaurant during her free time after school and has a sister who never speaks, even though she understands when others talk to her. Since young, Charlie has a secret no one knows other than her parents - she’s able to understand all the other languages other than Englaise and Parshon (her own language), which is extremely forbidden and dangerous. She has not been taught, not under the strict rule of course, but the meaning under the foreign language just rang in her ears when someone speaks them in front of her.

The starting of the story gives us a glimpse of the city ruled by Queen Sabara, which is rather unpleasant place, filled with refugees from other parts of the countries due to the on goings rebellions, and vendors selling things on streets yelling in Parshon, which clearly none of the refugees understands. There are armed guards everywhere, and we can picture how strict the rule is, looking at children showing their Passport even to enter the school.

Charlie has two friends with her, Aron and Brooklyn, who accompany her to school and they seem to be really good friends. One night, Charlie followed Brooklyn to a club after a little incident in the restaurant (Charlie accidentally looks into a girl who speaks Termani , and clearly Charlie’s dad is upset, since he tell her zillion times to always be careful) and that is where she meet Max.

Max, or Prince Maxmillian, grandson to Queen Sabara, is actually the spy for the queen to track the rebels. His first encounter with Charlie occurs in the restaurant when she accidentally stares up at a girl who speaks in Termani, and he soon finds himself gripped (yes, by her). Max's love story with Charlie progresses a little bit too fast, (Max compliments Charlie 'beautiful' in their first conversation). Not to mention the next few encounters when their attraction towards each other grow more and more. From a reader’s point of view, Max and Charlie look like they fall for each other because of their looks rather than whats inside them. If their love story can progress a little slower maybe it will be better.

Towards the second part of the story, where the rebel parties grow stronger and stronger, Charlie is forced to find refuge with her little sister Angelina. Little clues of Charlie being the royal blood starts to appear here and there, and I do enjoy the author’s sense of suspension. It makes me read the book in less than a few hours, not willing to close the book due to the cliff hanger in every chapter.

Back to the prologue of the story, it gives us a picture of the queen’s essence, which is repeatedly mentioned in the story. The essence is basically the queen’s soul. When her essence goes into a new body, the body will give her a physical appearance as a human, but when the body grows old and frail, she will have to find another body with the royal blood in order to survive. Till this generation, Queen Sabara has no female heir. She has a son and two grandsons, which means there’s no one who her essence can consume on. Based on the information from the book, the next royal blood female will have to say phrases like “take me instead” for the queen’s essence to consume her body. And there’s the interesting part. When the queen’s essence consume a body, the original soul and mind of the body will simply disappear and be replaced by the queen, but not in Charlie’s case. She seems to successfully regain the control over her body, even though the queen’s essence is still in her. That again, is a cliff hanger to the story, and it will be continued in The Essence, second book of the trilogy.

The book has a prefect suspension, leaving me hanging by the end of every chapter and  looking forward to the next one eagerly. However, the story progress a little too fast without much 'species', and I certainly expect more interactions between the queen herself and Charlie. The last few chapters give me a feeling that the author tries to rush through it and end the story. Same goes to the romance part, which I mentioned earlier. If there’s more interactions between Max and Charlie, I will definitely like the book better.

3 stars ***