There were no surprises in Gatlin County. We were pretty much the epicentre of the middle of nowhere. At least, that’s what I thought.

Turns out, I couldn’t have been more wrong. There was a curse. There was a girl. And in the end, there was a grave.

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she’s struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town’s oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.

Ethan has lived his whole live in Gatlin. He knows everything, what is expected of him, where he can go and his exact place in town. A place that Ethan desperately wants to break out off. Each day is the same. School, basketball practice, dinner, sleep. A routine that Ethan could repeat in his sleep, that is, if he got any sleep. Ethan has been plagued by dreams. Dreams so real that Ethan wakes up covered in dirt and water, dirt and water that can’t be explained away. Something is happening in Gatlin, and Ethan is at the centre.

Enter Lena. If being an outsider isn’t bad enough, Lena is the niece of Macon Ravenwood, commonly referred to as Old Man Ravenwood by the people of Gatlin, and living out at the old Ravenwood plantation, which superstitions has it is haunted. To top it all off, Lena isn’t what you would call ‘normal’ for Gatlin. For one, she has no interest in being a cheerleader, instead plays the viola, wears more black than the average person and sits at the front of the English class. To top it off, strange things seem to happen around Lena – windows exploding, thunderstorms appearing and changing room arrangements are just the beginning.

Ethan is drawn to Lena in a way that can’t be explained. Something about Lena reminds Ethan of the presences felt in his dreams. Suddenly, Lena becomes the centre of Ethan’s world. As everyone at Jackson High is doing everything they can to make Lena a nothing, Ethan is absorbing as much of her world as possible. Ethan is the only one who has noticed the sharpie-drawn number on her hand, and while his classmates are quick to blame Lena for the strange occurrences, Ethan tries to get Lena to open up and give her a chance to explain why they are happening. With Ethan not taking no for an answer, Lena eventually lowers her guard, slowly by slowly letting Ethan into her life.

And as more strange events occur, even Lena can’t deny that she feels the same connection that Ethan feels for her. Ethan is thrown headfirst into the world of the Casters and discovering an ancient connection to the past, along with Lena, they are pitted against the universe. As Lena’s 16^th birthday draws closer, Ethan and Lena must discover the key that could change Lena’s future.

Beautiful Creatures is one of those books that don’t happen very often. Fresh and new, Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl have woven an urban fantasy novel that gives the often over-done young adult romance genre something different. A love story told from the male perspective. Seeing the story and reading through Ethan’s perspective was something that I loved about this book. Too many romance books have the female character constantly fawning over the male lead. This didn’t occur, and it was the differences that made reading from Ethan’s point of view work. Ethan didn’t overtly say that he was in love with Lena, yet it was his attention to the small details surrounding Lena that allowed me as a reader to see the true depth of his love before Ethan would even admit it to himself. The material of the Caster’s was also something that I enjoyed immensely. Their whole world was this rich culture that was thought out and developed in fine detail, yet at all stages seemed plausible and read, especially the way that Lena and her family moved around the topic of their special abilities with people not of their family. Linked in with this was Ethan’s aunt Amma, a character that I fell in love with by the end of the novel. Along with the many members of Lena’s family and Ethan’s friends at school, there were many a variety of characters that made the world of Beautiful Creatures enriching and enjoyable to read about.

Beautiful Creatures is one fantasy world that I would like to visit.

Pages: 626

Publication date: Australia – 2010, USA – Dec. 2009

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*Beautiful Creatures is also our Book Club read for the month of January.  Join the discussion here.

Dru Anderson has what her grandmother called “the touch.” (Comes in handy when you’re traveling from town to town with your dad, hunting ghosts, suckers, wulfen, and the occasional zombie.)

Then her dad turns up dead—but still walking—and Dru knows she’s next. Even worse, she’s got two guys hungry for her affections, and they’re not about to let the fiercely independent Dru go it alone. Will Dru discover just how special she really is before coming face-to-fang with whatever—or whoever— is hunting her?

Dru’s world is very different to yours and mine. See, in her world there are many, many things that go bump in the night. Zombies, vampires and werewulfs are just the start of it. Dru’s dad is a professional monster fighter and has taught Dru how to take care of herself, but being the daughter of a demon hunter has its downsides. Dru has to be ready to pack up her entire life at a moments notice and hit the road. Life for Dru has been kind of lonely…

Then her dad comes home from some kind of demon killing mission one night all zombie-fied. Dru is no idiot, she knows that thing that looks like her dad isn’t really him, and she knows that unless she does something fast, she too could find herself six feet under. Without thinking twice, Dru slaughters her zombie-dad right in her very own living room.

More alone than ever, Dru decides that she can’t stay in her house for a minute longer, and takes off.

Meet Graves. He lives at the mall in some kind of backroom but that’s all we really learn about him. He’s hell bent on finishing high school with spectacular grades, but has that whole bad-boy allure about him. He’s completely mysterious and something tells me that we’re definitely going to learn more about him in the coming novels, but for now, all I can say is that I’m pretty certain he’s jonesing for Dru. Dru shacks up with him for a while (in the sleeping in the same room sense, not the romantic sense) and they develop and odd kind of friendship. Then they’re attacked by a stack of demon beaties and Dru realises that she’s not safe.

Enter Christophe. He’s a djampire and pisses Dru off instantly. He’s got information about her dad’s death – information which, he’s not readily giving up – and that makes Dru instantly suspicious of him. But he’s here to help, apparently, and Dru is faced with some pretty tough decisions. Does she let this half demon guy into her life for the sake of safety, or should she trust her instincts and run like hell – away from him, away from everything. It becomes pretty clear that Dru isn’t going to be able to help herself, but is Chris going to be the savior she’s looking for?

Dru is one of those tough-as-nails characters that has the potential to be a real girl power kind of role model for female teen readers. At the moment, though, I find her rock hard exterior a little frustrating. I wanted her to grieve the death of her father properly – I mean, she did slay his zombie butt, after all – and maybe she did, in her own rock hard way, but for me, she moved on from his death way too easily. Although I completely understand why she’s like this, I hate that she is so untrusting. I can forgive her for this, though, because she’s spent her whole life running from, and fighting big bad beasties. Can’t imagine you’d see too much humanity in anything like a demon, that’s for sure.

Strange Angels is all about the tension. From the first chapter right till the very end, each page is full of nail-biting tension. Unusually, though, I didn’t actually find myself compelled to keep reading. Strange Angels is full of unanswered questions, which frustrated me to no end. I can see, however, that having so many unanswered questions in the story is a bit of an aphrodisiac for some and will drive the kiddies wild.

The one thing I absolutely loved about this book was Lili St. Crow’s writing style. She manipulates the English language brilliantly and her imagery is outstanding. It was very easy to picture just what was happening in the story and my imagination came alive with all kinds of mental images. Even though I found many other aspects of this story frustrating, the fact that I loved Lili’s writing style so much made reading Strange Angels an enjoyable experience.

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Today is the one-year anniversary of the first day of my last period.

I’m not exactly celebrating.

When I lied to my mom about getting my period, it was the easiest escape route at the time. I didn’t think much of it because I was sure that sooner or later, it would turn out to be true. So every twenty-eight days I take tampons out of the box under the sink and flush them down the toilet to make her think that I’m cycling as I should.

But I can’t tell her now that my ovaries aren’t back from vacation. She’ll not only freak out and ground me for lying, but she’ll make me go to the gyno as well. And the very thought of getting up in the stirrups and letting a total stranger go elbow deep and up to my uterus … Jesus Christ!

This is not a book about teen pregnancy. This is not a book that advocates or condemns teen pregnancy. This is a book about Jessica Darling. Jess is many things – a runner, a daughter, an academic, a sister, and a friend – but pregnant is certainly not one of them. No sir. In order to be pregnant one would have to engage in sexual intercourse first, and that would require actually snaking the attention of her high school crush – Paul Parlipiano. But even though they run on the same track team Paul doesn’t even know she exists. So pregnancy, my dear friends, is so far from the reason Jess’s period is MIA it’s not even funny.

The real explanation is far more boring, far less scandalous, far more Jessica. Jess, you see, is a runner. She’s on the track team and she trains a lot. She has trouble sleeping and she’s really skinny. Even after her grueling training sessions, when she can’t sleep in the middle of the night, Jess gets up and goes running, hoping that she’ll tire herself out so she can sleep. She runs and runs and runs and runs. Jess knows this is the reason she hasn’t got her period, and although she knows its bad to go for so long without menstruating, her running seems to be a bigger priority.

Then one night, while out running, Jess injures her ankle. She manages to drag herself home limping and crying and moaning in pain. Exit excessive running here. In fact, exit all running here. At least now her dad can’t bug her about her track meets anymore, not being able to actually participate and all. But what about the middle of the night? How is she going to get to sleep now?

Enter Marcus Flutie. He’s the resident bad boy, the one everyone loves to hate. Turns out that he and Jess have far more in common than she originally thought – not that she was thinking of him, no sir, someone like Jessica Darling would never be thinking of someone like Marcus Flutie – and talking to Marcus in the middle of the night seems to be the only way Jess can get herself to sleep. Jess learns many things about Marcus, but the most important of all is that Marcus is so not the person she thought he was. Jess realises that she’s falling for him, but brushes it aside because she knows that Marcus doesn’t date girls like her. Besides, he’s got a floozy girlfriend anyway. She sees them groping in the hallways all the time. Gross. But Jess is beautifully naïve and often doesn’t see what’s right in front of her. Will Marcus lead good, wholesome Jess down a path of disobedience and destruction, like everyone thinks he will? And honestly, how can she stand him anyway? No one gets it… no one at all.

Jessica’s voice is raw and fresh. Megan McCafferty captures what so many teens are thinking but do not say. Jessica Darling is so real that she could be me, or you, or the girl sitting next to you on the bus. I bought every single word that came out of her mouth. Her way of looking at things brings light and humour to even the saddest and darkest of situations, and makes for one hell of an entertaining read. You’ll laugh, you might cry, but you’ll certainly feel every pang, every stomach churn that good ol’ Jess goes through. As her name suggests, she’s every bit the teenage darling.

One of the best books I’ve read in a long time. I positively cannot wait to get my hands on a copy of the next book in the series, Second Helpings.

P.S I think I’ve come down with a case of Flutie Fever. Watch out, I hear it’s very contagious.

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