Crashed

Crashed by Robin Wasserman
Young adult fantasy

This is the second in the "Skinned" series by Wasserman. While I liked Skinned, the first in the series, this was so much better! Start with Skinned, otherwise you will most likely be confused.

Spoiler alert: If you haven't read Skinned, don't read below!


In Skinned, we met Lia Kahn who is a mech, otherwise known as a skinner. She was in a terrible accident and her brain was downloaded into a computerized body. Needless to say, the adjustment from normal, poular teenager to girl with a computer/brain residing in a mechanical body wasn't all that smooth. After she was partly responsible for the near fatal accident of her best friend, she decides to leave her family. This is where Crashed picks up.

Life as a mech takes some time getting used to. You don't need to sleep or eat and you never get older. Time stretches out into the future with a mind-numbing similarity. On top of that, as a mech you don't really feel sensations the same as you used to as a regular old mortal. Lia is always looking for the next wild sensation, the daring adventure that will let her feel something, if only for a few minutes. Skydiving, cliff jumping she does it all to feel something.

Lia lives with Jude and Riley and a bunch of other mechs in a mansion, funded by a wealthy mech. Life changes for Lia when she and Riley find themselves in the middle of a terrorist attack in a corp town. They are blamed for the attack, or more specifically, Lia is blamed. Slowly, public sentiment is turning against mechs, their very existence is under threat--primarily due to a political crusader named Savona, the leader of the Brotherhood, who claims that the very existence of mechs goes against the will of God. As Lia, Riley and Jude delve deeper into the mystery of what happened at the corp town, it turns out that the Brotherhood won't stop at anything to destroy mechs, including innocent people. Just how far will the mechs go?