Young Adult Literature; Coming-Of-Age; Dystopian Literature
Matched is a coming-of-age story geared toward those who are about to come of age themselves. It deals with common themes of growing up like first love, friendship, family, and the struggle between being the person your family wants you to be and figuring out who you are on your own.
In addition, Matched throws in a dystopian element. It's not immediately obvious that the world is a train wreck as in books like 1984; instead the Society seems to have been optimized for perfection in just about every way: genetic perfection of offspring, perfect health until age eighty, everyone in an occupation they excel at… sounds great, right? Upon closer examination, however, it turns out not everything is as it seems, and there is a high cost to the perfection the Society strives to maintain.