The Thousandth Floor Series by Katharine McGee

Cover Art Courtesy of Goodreads

If you like Gossip Girl and futuristic societies, boy do I have the series for you! I recently read both books currently available in The Thousandth Floor series by Katharine McGee (The Thousandth Floor and The Dazzling Heights), and loved every minute of them! The story follows a set of teenagers from different backgrounds living in The Tower, which is basically New York City built upward into one building. With one thousand floors, The Tower boasts schools, homes, hotels, restaurants, shopping, and even a "Central Park." Technology is insanely developed, as people now wear contacts that allow them to communicate with one another, and use hovercraft to get from place to place. Movies are now called holos, hair and makeup can be done at the push of a button, and in-home computers can do anything from picking out your outfit to procuring a glass of water for you before bed. 

Main characters include Leda, a formerly poor but now wealthy girl struggling with drugs; Eris, the Serena Van Der Woodson of the group who recently discovered a terrible family secret that turns her life upside down; Rylin, a less-affluent girl who takes a job cleaning the home of one of the hottest boys on the upper levels; Watt, a technology obsessed boy who takes hacking jobs to provide for his family; and Avery, who is as wealthy as they come and lives in the thousandth floor penthouse pining over the one boy she is never allowed to love.

Cover Art Courtesy of Goodreads

I loved that both books immediately started off with a death, then flashed back to the story leading up to it. The whole time you were left to wonder who the person was that ends up dead, only finding out at the very end. Each chapter is told focusing on one character or another, allowing the reader further insight into him or her, and showing us how the different social classes interact with and rely on one another. While sometimes this method of storytelling can be confusing, there were no gaps and each character's chapter flowed seamlessly from one to the next. The class relations were realistic, and I loved envisioning the technological playground that these teens called home. McGee paints a very realistic picture of how technology has advanced, and even though so many of these things are still far from reach, it was easy to imagine how they all fit into daily life in 2118.

A third book, The Towering Sky, is coming out this August, and right now this is set to be the last book in the series, but I have my fingers crossed for more! I could definitely see this being adapted into a TV series as well.

The Thousandth Floor Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars

The Dazzling Heights Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars