History Literature / Matched

* ItIsPronouncedTroPAY: How many of you knew Cassia is pronounced "Kasha"?

* LoneSurvivor: Hunter is the last of his village.
** Ky is also the only survivor in his village.

* HandsOnApproach: Ky teaches Cassia how to write cursive by drawing the letters in the dirty with sticks.
* HiddenDepths: Ky is a poet and can draw recognizable portraits even on a dirty napkin. Xander [[spoiler: has a well hidden jealous streak: when they were younger, he dared Ky to take the red tablets without knowing what they did, which is how they find out about the memory-wipe effect.]]

** The pills;

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!!Tropes:

* TheAtoner: Oker

* ChildSoldiers: Eli.

* CoolBigSis: Cassia to Bram.
* CoolOldGuy: Cassia's grandfather.

* FullCircleRevolution: The Rising.

* LaResistance: The Rising.

* MouthyKid: Eli.

* OrphansOrdeal: Ky, Indie and Eli.

* StateSec: The Officials.

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* InconistentColoring: Ky's eyes appear to be different colors depending on his environment.

* KaleidoscopeEyes: Ky's eyes appear to be different colors depending on his environment.

* ManlyTears: Cassia is quite touched to see Ky crying during a war film, even though the special effects were terrible. It turns out the carnage onscreen was actually real.

* ChekhovSGun: In ''Matched'' the hikers were told to remove the flags that they had tied on the Hill, which would have enabled the Society to lay paths on the Hill. [[spoiler:The reason why the flags were no longer required was revealed in ''Reached'', when Ky discovers that the Hill had been flattened.]]
** Also mentioned in ''Matched'' was Cassia's mother's job assignment, where she had to travel to the Farmlands to investigate some crops. She mentioned a crop called sego lilies. [[spoiler:The importance of it was revealed in ''Reached'' where it was the key ingredient to creating a cure for the mutated Plague. The best part? Sego lilies apparently have another name, called mariposa lilies, and nobody (except Anna) knew that the two seemingly different plants were actually the same. Even more awesome, Cassia's mother's knowledge of the location of the sego lily fields gave Cassia the chance to save her mother first.]]

* FollowTheLeader: Like other dystopian romances published in the same time period, it wants to catch some of the sun that ''Literature/TheHungerGames'' is basking in. In this case, Cassia is Katniss, Xander is Gale, Ky is Peeta, Bram is Prim, and Eli is Rue.
** Some detractors have noted that the Society is ''uncomfortably'' similar to [[TheGiver the Community]].

** In terms of skills, it is mentioned that some people know how to grow crops, to harvest, and cook food. But even in terms of simple thing like carrots or onions, nobody knows how to do everything, meaning they can't feed themselves.

* RuleOfThree: There are three books in the series (it's called a ''trilogy'' for a reason), there are three pills; green, blue and red, and in ''Reached'' there are [[spoiler:three narrators, namely Cassia, Ky and Xander]].

* XanatosGambit: Near the end of the first novel, it's revealed that The Society have known about Cassia's secret relationship with Ky the whole time, and have been using it as an experiment to prove that Matching indeed makes people fall in love, since without it she would never have known Ky. If she had picked Xander, then they would have known that she was willing to obey what was expected of her. Either way, the Society would get what they wanted. [[spoiler:Ky was also told about him being matched to Cassia in ''Matched''.]]
** It should be noted that while the Official tried to avoid admitting it, The Society weren't the ones who put Ky's image on the microcard. They more or less just ran with it and spun it whatever way proved their system worked.

* GenreSavvy: Ky has evidently read ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', judging by his knowledge of how the Prisoner's Dilemma works.

!!!Tropes:

* Punchclock Villians: The Officials are predictably evil given the setting, but appear not to care about some disobedience. For instance, when Cassia crushes her red pill, the official looks at the ground and doesn't bother to check her hands. There are a number of other instances where they are effectively lax to an alarming degree (to the point of NiceJobFixingItVillian).

** to Cassia.

* NeverLearnedToRead: Most of The Society, since reading and books are outlawed.
** Not true.