Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

Imagine a world totally based on looks, a society where people are divided into categories based on their appearance, where the ultimate goal is extreme beauty, where anyone normal is ugly. “Everyone gets to be gorgeous. What could be wrong with that?” Uglies are teens age 12 to 15, who are sent away to boarding school and live in dorms, awaiting their 16th birthday, when they are given the surgery to make them one of the Pretties. Pretties have perfect eyes, perfect symmetrical faces, perfect skin, perfect height, perfect weight; they are just perfect and Pretty. Once you are Pretty, life is a big party and you can have whatever you want. Waiting for the surgery is the worst part. Waiting to see your friends again, friends whom you haven’t seen since they were turned Pretty.
Tally is having a hard time waiting the 2 months and 29 days until her sixteenth birthday. She has decided to sneak into New Pretty Town to see her best friend Peris, but is disappointed when he sends her away, making her promise she won’t get into trouble before her surgery. After a highly risky escape, involving a bungee jacket and a fire alarm siren, Tally is on her way back to Uglyville alone. That’s when she literally runs into Shay, another Ugly who happens to share her birthday. Tally and Shay become fast friends and spend the next 2 months and 23 days hoverboarding and exploring the Rusty Ruins. Three days before their surgery, Shay has a change of heart and decides to forgo the surgery and run away to live with friends in a hidden community called the Smoke. She begs Tally to come but Tally refuses, wanting to become a Pretty and finally reunite with Peris.
The day of the surgery finally arrives and Tally is ready to leave her life as a Ugly behind, barely packing anything other than the note Shay left with secret instructions on how to find the Smoke if Tally changes her mind. Tally is taken to the hospital and waits for one long hour before realizing something is wrong. She is whisked away to another location where everyone is strange looking, not ugly but almost a cruel pretty. Here at Special Circumstances, she is informed that her surgery has been postponed and she is interrogated and left with an ultimatum. Help us find Shay or give up your opportunity to become Pretty. So Tally must decide which promise she will keep: her promise to Peris, her old Pretty friend, or her promise to Shay, her new Ugly friend. Which friend, which life will she choose? How much is Tally willing to risk in order to avoid being one of the Uglies forever?

**Sequels: Pretties, and Specials