Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Amazon reviewers, you're failing me. How did this novel get such high reviews? The premise has potential, the storytelling is bland, and the ideological perspective inconsistent and authoritarian. The "utopian" ideal presented is one of a "socialist utopia" in which wealth and property is redistributed and religious liberty is non-existent. These are not interpretations; these are explicitly stated. The protagonist objects to slavery (great!) while promoting slavery (um, what?). The protagonist makes a big deal about not making decisions for others... and then proceeds to make all of their decisions for them as soon as they disagree with the protagonist. Right or wrong as the various decisions may be, the self-righteous, holier-than-thou hypocrisy is nauseating and pitiful. The characters are immature, shallowly constructed, and inconsistent. Example: Consistency of story and characterization is sacrificed to include weird, out-of-context, extended complaints about the Bible. The protagonist grew up in isolation and has a powerful love for stories and books, yet has only contempt for the Bible--she read it in 5 days and hated it because it was "only stories". This is just out-of-character silliness that suits the author's present-day perspective and pulls the reader out of the context of the novel. Dumb. Example: The protagonist was raised in isolation and deliberately kept hidden from the entire political and social structure of her surroundings. From the age of 1 to 19 she has only known and interacted with two elderly people. Yet she is able to outmaneuver heads of state, conniving bureaucrats, and the best warriors within hours and days of leaving her Sleeping Beauty style forest cottage? I won't even bother with the demonstrated lack of understanding of the historical contexts the author tries to weave into this book. Classic Mary Sue, written with less skill than much teenage fanfiction, and boring. 3/4 into the novel and on a four hour flight, I gave up and switched to the mind-numbing selection on Southwest's TV.