| Title | : | The Bar Code Rebellion (Bar Code, #2) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0439803853 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780439803854 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 265 |
| Publication | : | First published August 1, 2006 |
For reasons she doesn't completely understand - but will soon discover - Kayla is at the center of a lethal conspiracy that will soon threaten the very notion of freedom. Kayla can either give in to the bar code, or she can join the resistance and fight it. The choice, to her, is clear:
It's time to fight.
They want your identity.
They want your freedom.
They can't have them.
The bar code rebellion.
The Bar Code Rebellion (Bar Code, #2) Reviews
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Am I the only one who HATES KAYLA? She is such a selfish brat! Why can't mfumbe like someone who is WORTH caring about! OMG then she goes on FLIRTS with other dudes and than when they like her back she just says I have a BOYFRIEND. This isn't the exact same thing that happened but it went mostly like that. And what the heck is up with that other Kayla joining global-1. I mean, WHAT THE HECK! I rated it a 4 but really! It's a 2.
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The Bar Code Rebellion: Now With 100% Deus Ex Machina!
Warning: Spoilery review! Proceed with caution.
The bar code thing was interesting, but the plot twists and how the idea was developed was close to terrible. It all fell flat, shallow, and made little to no sense.
For instance, the main character is (supposedly) on the bad guys (aka government) "wanted" list. Still, she's not hiding. She goes out like it's no big deal. Like, excuse me? Are you stupid or what?
Things are solved way too easily, abusing with the Deus Ex Machina thing. The main characters barely face any troubles to get what they're looking for, in spite the info they're after is more than just Top Secret. Yet so, in no time they get everything they need—which was not believable at all. I rolled my eyes in several oportunities. If only I had such a good luck. -
Three stars for idea, only two for execution. Interesting, but characters were flat.
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The Bar Code Rebellion picks up right where The Bar Code Tattoo ends. Since it does not need to spend a lot of time on exposition this second and final chapter of The Bar Code series contains non-stop action. Although, in many ways, the fast pace read like a script for a typical action film: great special effects to cover up plot holes. The entire plot twist of Kayla discovering she is a clone (and it was a long drawn out process that my 6th grader picked up on immediately) doesn’t fit with the set up in the first novel as revealed by Kayla’s mother. I find it unbelievable that in this moment of drug induced revelation Ashley Reed fails to even hint at Kayla not being her biological child or a genetically modified clone. Also, the first book alludes to legal battles for clones in Europe. Apparently they are being refused bar codes. An interesting idea, but completely dropped in the second book, along with the idea of any other existing clones besides the KM-6s. And really, how on earth could Kayla’s father work for the FBI and still have gone “underground” and kept his cloned mother from the prying eyes of global-1? They really lost track of these infants? Not likely. And, then, of course, there is yet another romantic interest for Kayla. Actually, I must admit, I think I’m a little jealous by how quickly these guys fall into her lap. Maybe I should splice a little avian DNA into my genetic code.
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While I liked the first book because it gave us a glimpse into the making of a dystopian society, I felt this second book fell a bit flat.
First, the dialogue was a bit choppy. The wording was not natural and didn't flow like normal speech patterns. Part of the problem is all of the internal monologues that Kayla has going on in between each sentence when she talks to someone, or the constant visions. Her "thinking things out" got a bit monotonous, especially when it became pretty clear what was going on but she couldn't seem to get it.
Which brings me to the second thing that bothered me: it was very obvious that there was a nanotechnology thing going on, and the clone thing (trying not to spoil), way before the characters figured it out. I mean, come on! I thought Kayla was supposed to have some sort of psychic ability here!
And then the ending was pretty quick and easy. All of the sudden, they just happen to come upon the perfect solution. deus ex machina anyone? It was pretty easy to take down an evil, global superpower. They would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for those darn kids! -
Well, I have to say I'm warming up to this series, and I'll give it a 3.5, BUT still there are so many things in this book that I somewhat like, and then some that I absolutely hate. So, I guess I'm being generous with my rating, yet again.
The writing style was ok, but again with Kayla
First there was the telepathy, the shamans, and the whole healing shebang, then
There's not that much I can say about the book, without spoiling stuff, it didn't take me very long to finish the book like the first one, this only took two days, and I gave it 3.5, but in no way would I ever in ANY universe give this book 4 stars... NOT EVEN CLOSE! -
So I didn’t realize this was the second book in a series until I had started it and there were references to characters that I didn’t recognize. Still, I was able to jump in and follow along decently well.
The story was interesting, but there was a lot of tell and not enough show, which made the stakes seem fairly low.
This was written in 2006 and it was set in 2025, so there was a lot of disparity between what happened in the story between 2006 and 2020 and what actually happened. It made the book seem somewhat dated. -
The Bar Code Rebellion, by Suzanne Weyn, is the second book about seventeen-year-old Kayla Marie Reed and the world she lives in. In 2025, when the novel takes place, everyone, at the age of seventeen, is required to be tattooed with a bar code. The bar code is what people use for everything, from paying for bus fare to getting a job. In the first book about this world, The Bar Code Tattoo, Kayla's neighbor, the now-famous Gene Drake, was killed in a struggle because he had discovered something terrible about the tattoo, and wanted to tell the world.
More terrible, it seems, than what Kayla and other bar code resistors already know: that the tattoo contains each person's genetic code, gotten from the blood sample taken when they are tattooed. These codes can ruin a person's life, if they have problems such as bipolar disorder or Parkinson's disease in their family. That's what happened to Kayla's friend Amber and her parents.
Following Gene Drake's example, people everywhere are resisting the tattoo, even though it means forfeiting any chance at a normal life as a part of society. People are burning off the tattoo, or, if they join in time, refusing to get it in the first place.
One day, Kayla sees a girl on TV with her face, telling people how happy she is about the barcode tattoo. Next thing she knows, this girl is everywhere, pretending to be Kayla, and promoting the barcode tattoo. Is she a digital fake? Or is there more to it than that?
Suzanne Weyn's novel takes place in a scary future society. It's especially scary because it really could come true. We've all read books about what the future will be like, and chances are, none of them are exactly right. Everyone predicts, though, that the government will have more and more control over our daily lives, maybe even getting to the intense and frightening level in Bar Code Rebellion.
In this story, characterization takes a backseat to the action, but that's okay, as it's meant to be more about the plot and the setting than it is about the characters. Even though the characters feel a little two-dimensional, it's still a book worth reading, especially for fans of The Bar Code Tattoo. -
Meh. Took a good initial premise and more or less squandered it. I kept wanting to like this book more than I did, because it is fun enough and the author seemed good intentioned, but when I got to the final section, where the author resolved literally every loose end (and we're talking BIG loose ends, what used to be called the denoument and stuff) in less than fifteen pages, I couldn't be charitable any longer. Yeah, lots and lots of loose ends. Seen better endings in overlong Stephen King novels.
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Although I really enjoyed the first book in this series, The Bar Code Tattoo, I found the second book lacked it's originality. This book just took things too far & crazy. The secrets that Kayla is supposed to find out aren't very secret or very hard to find out & don't seem to have a whole bunch to do with the plot line other than to add some crazy into the mix. Kayla spends the whole first book learning how to do all this amazing stuff with her mind, which she then seems to forget she can do in the second book. When her boyfriend, Mfumbe, gets hurt, she doesn't even try to heal him with her mind, even though in the last book she managed to bring a bird back from the dead. I think she just liked that the first book was so popular & wanted to make a sequel, even though there really wasn't enough story for it. Then, after all this drawing things out & making more drama than is really necessary for any story line, it just kind of ends. It wraps up all the drama in 4 pages & ends it. I always hate the whole Deus Ex Machina endings, & this one has one big time. Find the uber person & she solves everything in 10 minutes flat, the end. It just made me mad.
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This second installment was better than the first. I still believe the psychic storyline was contrived and unnecessary, but the overall story flowed much better than the first. The idea is excellent. The execution of that idea still lacks ingenuity and left so much to be desired. Too much superficial “love story teenage angst” that just didn’t propel the story forward, but seemed more intrusive than interesting. Sometimes an author just doesn’t know what to do with such a great idea. If Neal Shusterman had taken this idea, I expect it would’ve been a spectacular story.
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The Bar Code Rebellion is written by Suzanne Weyn she is a magnifiecint writer who puts great detail in her work. This is her second book about the bar codes an cant wait to get the next one. Kayla has resisted the bar code tattoo she is one of the strongest on the run with different people trying to end the madness of the tattoo. And trying to figure out what the deep secret is in those tattoos that is ruining everyone's lives.
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Apparently this is the second book in a series, and I didn’t read the first one (Bar Code Tattoo). So I was thrown into the action of these characters I didn’t know, without any introduction to slowly warm up to them. I see the author made a point to make everyone racially diverse. IMO, things moved too fast. Some things didn’t make sense, like when Kayla walked across coals, cried and immediately fell asleep on the ground, and none of her friends came to her aid (112-113). I guess the simplicity can be good for young readers who don’t have long attention spans or deep thinking.
The reading level of this book is sixth grade, but the characters are 17+. There is romance, but nothing sexual. A few bad words like “bastard” and “damn.” There are some mature topics mentioned, such as suicide, schizophrenia, murder, theft, arson, & government corruption. The science behind the technology was realistic and well written. The most unrealistic thing in the book was telepathy.
Even though the story was simplistic, I appreciate that it was written. It’s a good book for middle school aged kids to understand politics, that not everything you see on the news is true, and the gravity and implications of real life government mandates and implanting technology onto/under our skin.
The book was published in 2006 but takes place in 2025. There were a lot of parallels between the book’s world and ours. Just as Jeffrey Epstein didn’t really kill himself, there are fake suicides in this book too (106). Just as democrats tampered with the 2020 election to get Biden elected, a corporation called Global-1 hacked computerized voting machines to get President Waters elected (22). Global-1 made all food GMO, just like Bill Gates wants to do (172). Just as the US performed illegal gain of function research in China, Global-1 used Korea to do their illegal scientific experiments (203). Just as covid-19 and the vaccine were used to lower human population, the bar code could kill people digitally (176, 197, 209). Just as the globalist elites want to replace cash with digital currency so that every transaction can be easily tracked and they can disable your bank account if they want, in this book cash money was eliminated five years ago and the bar code tattoo was the only acceptable form of payment (11). Just like our world’s scientists think they can wipe out all diseases with vaccines, the scientists in this book use the bar code tattoo to eliminate unhealthy people and want to use nanobots to wipe out all viral diseases and increase the human lifespan (30, 195). Just like with the covid-19 vaccine card and “Green Pass”, people couldn’t go to college, get a job, or see a doctor unless they got the bar code tattoo (11, 28, 67). Just as real hospitals wouldn’t make a genuine effort to help covid patients because letting their health worsen got them more money from insurance companies, the hospitals in this book wouldn’t help a patient who Global-1 wanted dead (250). Just as some judges take custody away from a parent who doesn’t want to vaccinate their child, this book’s parents are deemed unfit unless they get bar codes (215). Just like the vaccine was marketed for the greater good, so too was the bar code (118).
This dystopia was restricted to the US, so people could be safe if they got to Canada (38). But covid-19 responses were coordinated across the globe, so no where was safe. I like it when dystopias blame human nature instead of a single evil person/government/corporation. It’s too easy to hate that one single entity while ignoring our own contribution to the problem. But we should all realize that the evil lurks inside all of us, and we need to take action in ourselves to prevent the dystopia from coming. Feed by MT Anderson seemed to do that because the people willingly embraced the feed; it wasn’t forced on them; but the UN-like organization was condemning the US for its overconsumption, when in reality overconsumption is a global problem, and as long as mass production is allowed, it won’t stop. Feed was more realistic in its depiction of future teenagers—so dumb. This book’s teenagers were intelligent and into art and poetry.
“Strange, Kayla thought, not for the first time, that an odd character like Gene Drake—heavyset and badly groomed, reeking of cigarette smoke, nervous and uncharismatic—should be so deified and adored after his death” (72). Like George Floyd, eh? An ugly, broke, drug-addicted criminal who nobody cared about until a white cop put his foot at his neck. Now spoiled anarchist youth itching for excitement in their lives paint murals of his mug on buildings that don’t belong to them and use his name as an excuse to smash windows.
“Genes have multiple tasks. When they began trying to genetically cure sickle cell anemia they discovered that the same gene made people resistant to malaria. By knocking out the disease-causing gene, they could have caused a worse problem” (222). Moral: don’t try to alter genes.
“New technologies will always offer the greedy and power hungry new opportunities to oppress its citizenry. Advances in science must be made with due consideration. They can advance the health and wellbeing of all people, or they can enslave them. In a free society we must work together to make this a world where human dignity is the yardstick by which we measure progress” (257). -
Wow! very thought provoking.
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Interesting, but not totally put together. Lots of threads were brought up that didn't feel totally taken care of in enough detail by the end.
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Set in the year 2025 “The Bar Code Rebellion” centers around seventeen-year-old Kayla Reed and her friend Mfumbe Taylor’s resistance to being tattooed in a world where not accepting the bar code is considered an offense with severe consequences.
This story heats up when Kayla and Mfumbe attend a rally in Washington, D.C. expecting President Loudon Waters who’s in league with the multinational corporation Global-I heading up the implementation of the tattoos to resign, only to have the protestors confronted with a gas attack and arrests which include David Young the head of Decode, the organization against the bar code. Fearing further reprisals after releasing a battered and ill Mfumbe from jail and returning him to the care of his parents, Kara escapes to the desert, joining the Drakians’ resistance determined to discover answers to the side effects that are killing the protestors who were tattooed against their will.
Fast-paced and action-packed the intriguing and mystery-laden plot keeps you on the edge of your seat from the first page to the last. Intensity and suspense continually build as Kara and new Drakian friend Jack not only search the desert for her best friend Amber’s whereabouts but reconnect with Allyson after a tragic death, discovering the truth about her existence, and Global-I’s determination to find her.
Well-written and intense the pressure mounts to promote Kyla as the poster girl for the tattoo; to stop the depression and suicide tendencies targeting the jailed protestors; and to stop the government’s control of citizens’ behavior. In this plot there is an emotional conflict as romantic feelings flare between Kyla and Jack and she tries to keep her distance remembering how much Mfumba meant to her.
Breathing life and tension into the plot are compelling and committed characters like strong, kind and brave Kayla Reed; smart and down-to-earth Mfumbe Taylor; outspoken but warm-hearted Amber; Allyson the rational and realistic science whiz; as well as Jack the charismatic and confident techie genius. All fuel the story with their tenacity and spirit as it progresses to a surprising conclusion.
I thoroughly enjoyed “The Bar Code Rebellion”, the best book in this series so far. -
Read both Barcode Tattoo and Barcode Rebellion.
Overall, great idea, poor execution.
These 2 books were rushed. I personally think that if the author would have spent more time on these books they would have been an amazing series. The author basically just jotted this story from the top of her head, and didn't really put much effort into making it worth while. She didn't put much thought in the character development or the details of the story. She also underestimated her readers. The readers figured out that the girl on the TV was a clone WAAAYYYYY before the main character found out. Seriously?!
I don't know how these books got published to be honest. It had a lot of room for improvement.... Learn from this my fellow amateur authors out there, and don't rush your work. If you have an idea, do not stop until you are fully satisfied with your story. That is the secret to amazing work. Do not do what Suzanne Weyn did, and rush your writing because you need to meet a deadline on books to publish. Fun fact: Ms. Suzanne Weyn released easily 7 other books the same year "The Barcode Tattoo" came out, that's how you know the author rushed. -
Interesting story with a neat premise and some good concepts to think about. Some things with the writing bothered me, like how the news articles lacked standard convention. Interesting futuristic science ideas, though a couple were weird and didn't make sense. The story seemed to finish in a hurry and certain things were way too easy for the characters to pull off, but I'm aware this is a book for teens, and I'm twice that age, so I'll forgive some of those flaws (though they did interfere with my ability to get engaged with the story, which is why it took me so long to read this book). I read the first book as light reading in college, I think, and just never got around to book two until now.
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This wasn't as strong as the previous book, and really goes deep with astral projecting, which most younger teens aren't going to be intimately familiar with, which may make it a bit hard to understand for the intended age group. The ending was more than a little bit of a cop out, but younger readers will probably not have enough reading under their belt to recognize that and will enjoy it until they're adults rereading it and they will be surprised it opened so many doors for them when it's such a under developed, relatively hacky attempt at using a blatant Deus ex machina to wrap things up quickly and neatly on a hopeful note.
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Okay, so first off I’ll admit I didn’t read the first book.
Second, one of the first things that stuck how to me is that Sen. Young spoke out about everyone’s “Constitutional right to privacy.” Fun fact! You HAVE no Constitutional right to privacy! No where in the Constitution does it say that.
The books itself was jumpy. It combined end of the world with supernatural and about 400 other themes and was just odd. It felt young, but not because of its intended audience, but because of the writing style. I think it could have been a great book...with a more mature author and better editor. -
The book Bar Code Rebellion is about a girl named Kayla who has refused getting the barcode tattoo not caring that it means she cant live a normal life and without it she's a fugitive but later in the book she finds out that she's been sucked into a lethal conspiracy because a machine called the behavior control program that affect everyone's freedom and she is given two choices one is to get the barcode tattoo and give in or fight. She chooses to join and fight and later meets a guy who she falls in love with who helps her stop the behavior program
