Unwind by Neal Shusterman

From Goodreads:

In a society where unwanted teens are salvaged for their body parts, three runaways fight the system that would "unwind" them.

Connor's parents want to be rid of him because he's a troublemaker. Risa has no parents and is being unwound to cut orphanage costs. Lev's unwinding has been planned since his birth, as part of his family's strict religion. Brought together by chance, and kept together by desperation, these three unlikely companions make a harrowing cross-country journey, knowing their lives hang in the balance. If they can survive until their eighteenth birthday, they can't be harmed -- but when every piece of them, from their hands to their hearts, are wanted by a world gone mad, eighteen seems far, far away.

In Unwind, Boston Globe/Horn Book Award winner Neal Shusterman challenges readers' ideas about life -- not just where life begins, and where it ends, but what it truly means to be alive.

Either I have a thing for futuristic dystopian novels or they're really common, because I've read a whole lot of them this year.

The concept of Unwind is absolutely horrifying. Unwanted teens are "retroactively aborted" and sent to "harvest camps" where they are dismantled and their pieces are farmed out to those who need them. It's organ donation on crack and there's a scene told from the point of view of a kid being unwound that's probably the most deeply unsettling thing I've read in a long time.

This book tackles some really heavy issues: pro life vs. pro choice, the power of propaganda (the government argues that unwinding isn't death, rather a chance to live on in a "divided state"), the existence of the soul and what happens to it when a body is divided, parental responsibility ("storking" is almost as horrifying as unwinding), and so much more. Shusterman even takes a jab at those obnoxious standardized state tests when a character mentions that his class never got around to learning about the Heartland War, something that fundamentally changed his country and affected his life since the "Bill of Life" that ended it legalized unwinding, because they had to do state testing.

Shusterman also preys on some deep seated fears. The teenage fear that adults don't actually see you as a person. The worry that, in receiving an organ or other tissue from a donor, you are accepting a foreign consciousness into yourself that could infringe on your autonomy. The terror brought on by suicide bombers. The fear that you might not own your own body and that some large nebulous governing entity could take it and your freedom from you at will.

There was just so much to think about in this one. I found myself wishing I had read it as part of a book club or something so we could discuss all this stuff.

I could barely put Unwind down while reading and, several days later, I haven't put it down mentally either. A good, strong read all around.