It's been a long wait. But well worth waiting for! The Noughts and Crosses trilogy started a few years ago, and the first book - Noughts and Crosses - was one of the best books I've ever read. It was on the BBC's "Big Read" 100 best books list, and is also in the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die.
The story is vaguely Romeo and Juliet, partly based on apartheid, and is very contemporary, dealing with issues of terrorism as well as racism and immigration. The love story is poignant, and at times you want bad things to happen, because the only alternative is even worse. Noughts and Crosses has one of most heartbreaking endings I've read in a book. The second book, Knife Edge, and the final installment, which I read in almost one sitting and finished just before midnight yesterday, continue the stories of the main characters over the next 16 years.
If the first book is the the possibility of hope, and the second is the loss of hope, then the third is the hope of hope. Once again, as the characters develop, reality kicks in, and even though you want the ultimate happy ending, you realise that there probably won't be an entirely happy one - but there may be a hopeful one, which would be enough. You hope and feel for the characters, agonising over their misunderstandings and their fears, frustrated over their inability to be honest and open with each other - but understanding, having read the other books, why it came to be this way.
I highly recommend the whole Noughts and Crosses trilogy (and anything by Malorie Blackman.)
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