Jacqui lives as Jack in a dangerous zombie-ish dystopia caused by a vaccine's unforeseen effects. Searching for her missing older brother, Jacqui joins forces with Fiona Tarsis (Stung), who has the cure for the rabid vaccine recipients, but they are sidetracked by raiders. Mysterious romance and eleventh-hour reveals do not rescue this sequel from its meandering plot and clunky gender politics.

Seventeen-year-old Jack, aka Jacqui Bloom, lives as a boy and trains to fight within her family's Denver home, now a fortress in a post-apocalyptic world brought about by flu in genetically modified bees whose stings cause people to turn into deformed, violent beasts. Not only beasts, but bands of guerilla raiders seeking food and women, threaten civilians who must live outside the walled city, a refuge available only to the non-obese healthy. Jack, determined to find her missing older brother, escapes from her home one night and reaches the city. She does not find her brother there, but she does connect with old friends Fiona, Fiona's brother Jonah, and Fiona's husband Bowen, all of whom agree to go with Jack on her search in hopes of finding Fiona's mother. As they leave the city, Jack wonders about a huge backpack supposedly filled with water that Jonah carries. Many harrowing encounters follow, but the companions are joined and aided by Kevin, a young man with inside information and food sources, who appears strongly attracted to Jackan attraction that becomes mutual.Following Stung (Bloomsbury, 2013/VOYA October 2012), this second of the series introduces a new heroine who remains a lesser copy of The Hunger Games/ Girl with the Dragon Tattoo heroines. Jack, more interested in romance with Kevin than survival, vacillates between excitable foolishness and hormonal meltdown. There seems to be little connection among the events of the plot line, and characters, other than Jack, are one-dimensional. Nevertheless, teenage girls interested in young love in dangerous circumstances are likely to find Cured a very satisfying read.Laura Woodruff.