Wither (2011)

Wither is a 2011 young-adult dystopian novel written by Lauren DeStefano. It was originally published on March 22, 2011, by Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing. It is set in a future where scientists succeeded in engineering a perfect generation of humans, free of illness and disorders, but as a consequence, also created a virus that plagues that generation's children and their children's children, killing females at age 20 and males at age 25. The fallout from this disaster drastically set apart the poor, who scavenge for food in a society that has few to no workers, from the rich, who celebrate each new building built as the continuance of the human race. It is the first book of The Chemical Garden Trilogy. The second book, Fever, was released in February 2012. The third and final book, Sever, was released in February 2013.

Plot

Wither describes a future wherein genetic engineering has cured humanity of all diseases and defects. People worldwide have foregone conceiving children naturally in favor of this new science. This generation of perfect humans, later dubbed "The First Generation", have lived very long and prosperous lives. Unfortunately their children, though also born perfectly healthy, were plagued with a virus that killed all females by the age of 20 and all males by the age of 25. Their children's children suffered the same fate. Humanity now scrambles for a cure as society has broken down into large gaps between the rich and the poor. Gatherers hunt for young girls on the streets to sell them into labs for research, and the unwanted ones go into prostitution or are simply killed. Others are occasionally sold to rich men to be their brides.

In Manhattan, Rhine Ellery and her twin brother Rowan live alone in their parents’ old home; their scientist parents were killed in an explosion at their laboratory when the twins were twelve. Now sixteen, Rhine is captured by the Gatherers and sold to 21-year-old Linden Ashby at his estate in Florida. She blames her being chosen rather than killed on her eyes, having blue-brown heterochromia that Rowan shares. Rhine finds herself forced to marry Linden along with two other girls, 18-year-old Jenna and 13-year-old Cecily. They join Rose as Linden's new brides, but the ailing Rose is already 20 years of age and does not have long left to live. Upon meeting Rose, Rhine is told that she and Linden are perfect for each other; they have the same amount of time left. Horrified by this, Rhine instantly begins plotting how to return to Manhattan and her brother.

Life in the Ashby manor is very comfortable. Cecily embraces it, having been an orphan longing for a family, and Jenna endures it forlornly while Rhine constantly thinks of ways to escape. She befriends her servant Gabriel and behaves as a good wife in front of Linden and his father, Housemaster Vaughn, in order to earn the title of "First Wife", which would grant her additional privileges to roam the mansion. Rhine sets that as a goal in order to plan her escape.

Rose grows more ill as Vaughan, an experienced doctor and scientist, experiments with ways to treat the virus and prolong her life despite her desire to die in peace. After her eventual death, Linden isolates himself before Rhine reluctantly coaxes him out of hiding. Soon after, he turns his attention to Cecily, who falls pregnant. Jenna and Rhine bond and Jenna admits that she was a prostitute in the Scarlet District prior to her abduction and was Gathered alongside her two younger sisters, who were shot to death rather than being sold as brides. Rhine offers to help her escape, but Jenna says she has nothing to return to and would rather die in the comfort of Linden’s mansion.

After accidentally going down to the basement with Gabriel, Rhine comes across attendants carting a gurney down the hallway, realizing the body on the gurney belongs to Rose and learning from Gabriel and Deirdre, Rhine’s young domestic, that Vaughan experiments on the bodies of anyone who dies within the mansion. She also learns from Deirdre that Rose had a stillborn daughter when she was nineteen, but that both Rose and Deirdre had heard the baby cry after birth; Rhine comes to believe that Vaughan killed his grandchild to spite Rose and to gain a new test subject.

During a hurricane, the brides, Linden, and Vaughan move to the storm shelter in the basement and Rhine sits with Linden to look over blueprints for houses he’s designed. He has sketched the houses in vivid detail, fascinating Rhine and causing them to bond. They nearly kiss, and Rhine is so disgusted by this that she waits for the next hurricane to break the window in her bedroom. She climbs out and runs across the grounds, becoming seriously wounded by flying debris and being returned to the mansion. She recovers from her wounds and Gabriel expresses his fear of losing her, whereupon they kiss for the first time but quickly separate when they hear a noise in the hallway. Jenna and Cecily come to visit her as her recovery continues and the three sister wives bond further.