Birthmarked by Caragh M. O’Brien

This debut novel is an enthralling dystopian fantasy.  Gaia’s mother is a midwife and now at age 16, so is she.  Each month, the first children born must be advanced to behind the wall of the Enclave, escaping the poverty outside the wall.  It is Gaia’s duty to turn those children over just as her two older brothers were turned over.  Gaia herself was no advanced because of her scarred face.  But now Gaia’s parents have been seized by the Enclave and no one knows why.  When they do not return, Gaia decides to sneak inside the wall and see if she can find out what has happened to them.  Through her journey, Gaia learns that the lies being told to her and the others outside the wall are many and complex, but that one girl can still make a difference with one heroic act.

It took me some time to read this novel because I was savoring it.  The world building that O’Brien has done here is based on our own familiar world, but one that has suffered a climate catastrophe.  O’Brien offers just enough details about the world to make it clear, but concentrates more on the human situation than the environmental one.  Her society is complicated, fascinating and well rendered.  The same can be said of the heroine, Gaia.  She is bright though uneducated, defiant, clever and brave.  She is a great lens to view the society and her situation through.

There is adventure and romance in this novel, all told through the eyes of the girl who is a loner and outsider because of her disfiguring scar.  Get this into the hands of those who enjoy Tamora Pierce, because they will love this heroine and wait impatiently along with me for the next in the series.  Appropriate for ages 13-16.

Reviewed from copy received from Roaring Brook Press.