Review: Fallen by Lauren Kate

Tags: YA, paranormal, fallen angels, love triangle, boarding school


Summary

When 17-year-old Luce Price enters Sword & Cross reform boarding school in Savannah, Georgia, she is immediately attracted to the aloof, gorgeous, and strangely achingly familiar Daniel Grigori. Luce could swear she feels a connection with him, but Daniel rebuffs all her attempts to get to know him better, and even though another hot guy named Cam is paying her a lot of attention, Luce still can’t Daniel out of her mind.

Little does Luce know that Daniel is trying to stay away from her for both of their sakes. For they are irrevocably connected by a cruel curse—one that will kill Luce if she gets too close to Daniel…

Review

If FALLEN is the future of YA supernatural fiction, then I fear for this genre. FALLEN is painfully dull and slow, with very little besides the concept of fallen angels and the suggestion of an impossible romance to recommend it to readers.

If the plot of FALLEN were to race a glacier, the glacier would win. From the moment Luce arrives at Sword & Cross, the plot feels like it’s always tripping over its own feet in order to explain itself, and to no avail. I don’t mind a gradually building plot if it contains atmosphere and sets up the exposition well, but the setting of Sword & Cross was never fully realized for me, and the events in Luce’s past that landed her at reform school never attained credibility. Luce floats through boarding school life in a series of disconnected and awkwardly written encounters with her schoolmates, none of which helped me understand Luce or any of the other characters. All of the action and scenes required to get the gist of the story occurred within the last 60 pages, and what happened was not worth plodding through 400 pages of irrelevance to get to that point.

All of the characters in FALLEN were static and artificial, something that less discerning Twilight-fangirling tweens won’t mind but that more well-read readers will definitely take issue with. Luce is about as passive as a bowl of rice pudding. You think Bella didn’t do anything for three-and-a-half 400-plus-page-long books? Luce just might make Bella look like head of the school spirit squad. She flits from scene to scene, never being fully integrated into the immediacy of the story and never coalescing into a comprehensive character. The thing I most remember about her was that she had short hair from when it got burnt off in a fire. If the way I describe a character is by the length of her hair and not any, I dunno, actual personality traits, you better believe that is a serious problem.

Along those same lines, Cam and Daniel were similarly bland male love interests whose only identifiable characteristic was their inexplicable—and inevitable, in this sort of book—attraction to Luce. I constantly got the two mixed up and couldn’t pick them out from a handful of YA male love interests if I had to. I am hardly questioning the appeal of stalker-y, unequal-power-dynamics love—there is a reason why so many of us love bad boys so much—but to have Cam and Daniel be so one-dimensional and predictable, while the story practically insists that we’re supposed to find them heart-stoppingly attractive…sorry, but I really don’t need that.

We’ve all heard the quiet rumblings that fallen angels might be the Next Big Thing in YA lit, but only if they’re done right. FALLEN read like a boarding school story with smatterings of the supernatural dashed throughout, the angels-and-demons element only manifesting itself in the final few chapters. It was a discomforting read because it was so detached from those elements of humanity that make even the most fantastical novel relatable: the Southern setting was never fully realized, and the characters were difficult to empathize with.

That being said, FALLEN gets two stars from me because I can totally see its appeal to middle school girls who have devoured the entire Twilight series and now desperately need something to read in between the next House of Night book and the Eclipse movie coming out in Summer 2010. It contains all the elements of a trendy YA bestseller: a paranormal element, a love triangle, two powerful love interests who compete for the same girl. Unfortunately, the great idea was poorly executed, and I won’t be following the rest of this series. However, consider asking your thirteen-year-old sister or cousin for her opinion on FALLEN, and you might get a totally different point of view, one that justifies why Random House believes that FALLEN will be huge in YA.

Similar Authors
Stephenie Meyer (Twilight)
P. C. Cast and Kristin Cast (House of Night series)

Writing: 2/5
Characters: 1/5
Plot: 1/5

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5


Cover discussion: 2.5 out of 5 - It's...cool, I guess? Definitely discombobulated and rather unrelated to the story--kind of like many scenes in the story itself, I suppose.


Delacorte / Dec. 8, 2009 / Hardcover / $17.99


ARC sent by publisher for review.

Comment on this review for an extra entry into my Lauren Kate giveaway.

Lauren Kate GIVEAWAY!

By now you've probably heard of Fallen by Lauren Kate, coming out from Random House on Dec. 8, which will most likely be really popular with lots of readers--even though *whispers* I personally didn't enjoy it that much. What you might not know, however, is that on Nov. 12, Lauren Kate came out with another book from Razorbill, called The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove, which is a mixture of Cruel Intentions and Macbeth that will appeal to fans of Kate Brian's Private series, for example, for its similarly delicious writing style and characters you love to hate.

 

That being said, I'm giving you the chance now to win these two ARCs! There will be ONE winner, who will receive both ARCs. Then you can see for yourself what you think about these books.

To enter, simply leave your email address.

For extra entries:

+1 if you follow me or start following me

+1 for each place you link to this giveaway (blog posts, sidebars, Twitter, etc.). On Twitter, please mention @stephxsu in order to get your extra entry

+1 if you comment on my review of The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove (+2 if you commented on it before today, 11/23/09)

+1 if you... ? Stay tuned.... :)

This contest is INTERNATIONAL and will end on Thursday, Dec. 10, 2009. Good luck!

Review: The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove by Lauren Kate

Tags: YA, popularity, murder, drinking

Rating: 3 out of 5


Summary

High school senior Natalie Hargrove has worked hard to get from trailer trash to a ruling member of Palmetto High School. The culmination of her work should be the much coveted Palmetto Princess crown, alongside her longtime boyfriend, Mike, who should be a shoo-in for Prince. However, one person may stand in her way of couples glory and domination: her least favorite person, Justin Balmer, who is a reminder of all that Natalie has tried to get away from.

After a wild party, Natalie and Mike devise a prank to give Justin a little of what he deserves…except that the prank turns out horribly wrong. Now, Natalie must scramble to cover up their tracks and lay the blame on someone else as everyone she trusts begins slipping away from her. Can Natalie use her considerable scheming prowess to save her reputation and future, or has she crossed the line this time?

Review

THE BETRAYAL OF NATALIE HARGROVE is an unapologetically guilty-pleasure read that will make your insides squirm with half-pleasure, half-horror. With a wonderful voice, tantalizing characters, and a steady plot, this book seems tailor-made for teen girls looking for a fast and furious read.

Natalie reminds me of many bitchy and manipulative queens of high school society. Her voice is spot-on and full of judgment against those who cross her path as well as the constant fear that she will be exposed as a fraud. She is the girl you love to hate, and yet can’t read enough about. Though definitely callous at times, Natalie is also simultaneously the desperate, lost girl struggling to gain footing on a suspicious land. Her actions may be despicable, but she is also wonderfully justified in doing what she did, which is a remarkable achievement on Lauren Kate’s part.

Indeed, I found almost all of the characters fascinating with their complicatedly bad sides. Here, there are no perfect characters, and it’s almost like watching a CW drama, the way you can’t look away from these train wrecks of characters. (On a side note, I believe I also have a bit of a bad-boy crush on Justin.) Nobody really changes much throughout the story, but they are interesting enough that you just might overlook that and focus on the drama itself.

The story slowly unfurls Natalie’s past, as well as what happened between her and Justin. It can be an infuriating process, the way hints are dropped sporadically, unhelpfully. However—and it may be my slightly masochistic side saying this—I found the ending satisfying, in all its shock and, yes, even unexpected sweetness.

THE BETRAYAL OF NATALIE HARGROVE may not be for everyone, but if you’re willing to overlook the fact that all of these characters and the entire situation itself are far from admirable, you’re in for an enjoyable ride.

Similar Authors
Courtney Summers (Cracked Up to Be)
Kate Brian (Private series)
Cecily von Ziegesar (Gossip Girl series)

Writing: 3/5
Characters: 3/5
Plot: 4/5

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5


Razorbill / Nov. 12, 2009 / Paperback / $9.99

Waiting on Wednesday (22)

This past week was a good one in terms of discovering books I would love to read. But in a rather eyebrow-raising coincidence I discovered great-sounding two books, with uncanny similarities...

EDIT: Thanks to some keen-eyed fellow bloggers, it appears that I've been misinformed about the two author names. I thought Fallen was by someone named Kate Lauren, but it turns out that both Fallen and Betrayal are by one person: Lauren Kate. Someone please tell Goodreads, Barnes & Noble, and numerous other book websites that they need to change their information as well. Thanks for the heads-up, guys! :)

Fallen by Lauren Kate
(Random House / Dec. 8, 2009)

Seventeen-Year-Old Luce is a new student at Sword & Cross, an unwelcoming boarding/reform school in Savannah, Georgia. Luce’s boyfriend died under suspicious circumstances, and now she carries the guilt over his death with her as she navigates the unfriendly halls at Sword & Cross, where every student seems to have an unpleasant—even evil—history.

It’s only when she sees Daniel, a gorgeous fellow student, that Luce feels there’s a reason to be here—though she doesn’t know what it is. And Daniel’s frosty cold demeanor toward her? It’s really a protective device that he’s used again . . . and again. For Daniel is a fallen angel, doomed to fall in love with the same girl every 17 years . . . and watch her die. And Luce is a fellow immortal, cursed to be reincarnated again and again as a mortal girl who has no idea of who she really is.

Well, right now Becca Fitzpatrick has cornered the market on fallen angels for me, but I'm still curious to see how this will turn out. I'm no Team Zombie, I'll admit, and vampires are definitely starting to get overwhelmingly prolific and cliche. So, fallen angels it is!

And here's the other one:

The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove by Lauren Kate
(Razorbill / Nov. 12, 2009)

A steamy Southern beauty makes one fatal mistake...

Natalie Hargrove would kill to be her high school’s Palmetto Princess. But her boyfriend Mike King doesn’t share her dream and risks losing the honor of Palmetto Prince to Natalie’s nemesis, Justin Balmer. So she convinces Mike to help play a prank on Justin. . . one that goes terribly wrong. They tie him to the front of the church after a party—when they arrive the next morning, Justin is dead.

From blackmail to buried desire, dark secrets to darker deeds, Natalie unravels. She never should’ve messed with fate. Fate is the one thing more twisted than Natalie Hargrove.

Cruel Intentions meets Macbeth in this seductive, riveting tale of conscience and consequence.

Yay, sinister intents, deaths, and beautiful teenagers gone wrong! No, seriously, every once in a while I just want to read something that's like Gossip Girl for the paranormal and non-upper-class set, and this book looks like it can deliver.