I'm not cussing after this one but I'm not all that thrilled, either. After the infuriating madness that was book 3, I was really hoping this would prove to be the glue I was looking for. I had high hopes at the beginning. Needless to say, they were dashed. Again, it's a good read. I like the characters and the story moves along well. I was intrigued to see what would happen. I liked it - it just didn't satisfy. This book starts out (Before) by following a new character, Claire, and backtracking to her story in the community where we first meet Jonas and Gabe. I thought this was a positive start. Claire's story is a well-told one. You live with her from the beginning through the moment of her being curious about the process of being a Birthmother, through her confusion of decertification, and her longing to find and spend time with her son. 
 Sidenote: The first chapter introduces us to this nameless girl who is going through the birth process because that is her assigned job. Lowry here felt the need to wrap up the chapter not just by naming her, but by stating "She was fourteen years old." Why? It seems so inauthentically judgy. This is a very efficiently run community. We already know they get assigned at Twelve and spend a year training before starting in their jobs. They're also becoming child care workers, elderly service workers, lawyers and whatever else. So why single out her age here? That's her job. At 14 in modern-day America, perhaps it is scandalous but why try to make this seem shocking in this fictional world of your own creation? 
 Because she is not taking the pills, she has a realness to her, like Jonas. She sees and feels things that don't make sense and has real confusion. She asks questions that I, from my current planet and time, would also likely have were I to end up in her place suddenly. So, yeah, positive start. But I already know what happens to Gabe in the community so now I'm thinking I'll get to find out what happened after Jonas escapes with Gabe - the craziness that ensues in the community afterward, through the eyes of one left behind with the newly released memories, and clear up all the questions I had lingering after books 1 and 3. And then... she escapes, too. Just a day or two after Jonas. I get it, I suppose. She's feeling legitimate love and attachment to this child she knows she can't have under the current ways of the community. She's overwhelmed by emotion. It makes sense that, when she hears Gabe is gone, she wants to go, too, and find him and have him as a mother should be able to have her baby. Except that's not maybe exactly why she left. 
 Then, through the blurred confusion of the memories, she found that she was on the boat. ... She fell. Sprawled on the floor, she heard things slide loose and break. She felt a rush of water, suddenly, it pulled at her clothing.She was blindly running... somewhere... because she had just received the devastating news that her baby was gone. And then she somehow managed to fall out of the boat while she was on the floor? I'm no boating expert (or even a novice), but that just doesn't make sense in my head. If I was going to try to stop myself from falling overboard, I'd definitely lie on the floor. Perhaps this is just a misconception of mine but, thus begins my confusion. 
 We move to part II (Between). (view spoiler)[Claire has fallen out of that boat and been rescued by some other folks in another boat. And, except for knowing her name, she's got amnesia. She forms a friendship with Einar, a local who's got two half feet from an injury he sustained when he tried to leave from this village by climbing a huge mountain. Cue Rocky montage with music. He trains her to become strong enough to make the same journey so that (now that she has recovered her memory over time and remembered she wants to find her baby), she can also leave via the mountain. But, um, this makes no sense. Presumably, no one is being held hostage in this village. A few have tried to "climb out" and only one actually succeeded, well, sort of succeeded. But, why didn't those few also just boat out? They live on a river. They have fishermen. Lots of them. There were at least 4 men available to carry Claire to town after rescuing her. Even if the river dead-ends at their village (which I'm not sure it does), since they don't know what exists outside of their land, why is the side facing the cliff the only way out? Obviously, they could take the river to wherever it goes... or keep wandering into the forest and see where they end up. If you're trying to escape from where you are, any direction should be a good direction, right? Claire has developed a fear of water so she naturally isn't interested in leaving the village on a boat. Okay. But everyone before her? I'm not buying it. She then embarks on this journey for which she has been thoroughly prepared through Einar's unbelievably accurate and detailed memory of the terrain. He literally dreamed of his journey to the point where he was able to draw her a map. The two and a half chapter recounting of her passage is quite engaging despite it being largely understood that she will have no problem with this trip and, for the most part, she doesn't. There's the lost glove and the hasty decision to guzzle her water so she can reach her salve and the murdering of baby birds - just enough drama to make it interesting but we're never concerned that she won't make it. Arriving at the top, we see that she meets the Trademaster, whom we already dislike from book 3, as a huge set up to part III. My issue with this is, oddly enough, in the dialogue of the Trademaster. He's a sleaze, we know. But we've had no reason to think him outright dishonest. So, when he starts babbling about fair trades, it annoys me. Claire has no expectation that she's going to give something minor in trade - she already knows she's dealing with someone who hacked off a man's feet because he wouldn't trade. He knows he's not going to make a fair trade because he's met himself. I read book 3, so I know he's a soul-sucker. So why have him mention fairness as if he gives a damn? Who are you trying to fool? 
 (Beyond) Claire has battled amnesia, done gladiator-level training, scaled a cliff and traded away her youth to find this baby of hers. And she finds him. But because she's old, she decides not to reveal who she is to him or anyone else for seven or so years. Plus also, isn't taking her youth to make her within a decade of dead a bit excessive? That seems like a stretch just to move the story to a climax. This baby child young man has the gift to feel people's feelings but, rather than see what's going on with the crazy old lady who's been spying on him from the bushes for years, he uses it to see what his friends who carve their names in his oar are thinking. Huh? Blah blah blah... the story finally gets revealed. The evil is confronted. And defeated with the revelation of a mere 3 happy endings to Evil's centuries-long reign of plots to ruin lives. Um, what? (hide spoiler)] 
 And that's it. Four books. Series done. We still don't know what happened in the community after Jonas left or in the town when Kira stayed. Or, for that matter, how Matty saved Village by healing Forest. It doesn't make sense why the gift needs to fade as the holder gets older. I don't think I'm the type of person who needs to have everything wrapped up in a neat package at the end. I appreciate the open-endedness of some stories. (view spoiler)[With this one, I'm perfectly content to wonder if, now that Claire and Gabe have been reunited, they make it back to Einar. Or if Gabe will get his boat made properly. Or if the children of Jonas and Kira will also have gifts. (hide spoiler)]But I can't help but feel like book 3 was just filler so book 4 would have some context and the stories begun in books 1 and 2 were simply abandoned, as opposed to left with a bit of mystery.