Marked (House of Night #1) by P.C. Cast

"It's a whole bottle of After School Special mixed with Vampire Finishing School. The Cast, Mother/Daughter writing team managed to create an interesting concept. Unfortunately, the shallow characters and painfully contrived storyline made for a truly cringe-worthy read."

1 Star

Pros: Casts take on Vampirism is definitely unique, I'll give them that. Equating "the change" of becoming an adult Vampire to basically, puberty or menopause, well, it was definitely one way to rationalize it.

Cons: Teenage colloquialisms of "OMG, like, no way", "OMG, he's so hot and he so likes you" ad nauseum.

Full Review:

Zoey is your regular, unhappy, moody teenager, dissatisfied with her home and personal life. That all seems trivial though when one morning someone shows up at her locker at school, while her friend is babbling inanely, oblivious. The man looks at Zoey, mutters some canned, cryptic, ritualistic words and bam, Zoey is now a fledgling Vampire. Now she has to uproot her entire teenage life and move to the House of Night, which is essentially Vampire finishing school.

The concept was definitely unique. But Casts writing was melodramatic, overdone, sappy and frankly, childish. There was a strange imbalance with the Zoey character too. At times, seemingly well versed in very adult situations, she would then go onto use words such as poopie and boobies, more than once. The ending couldn't have been more overdone or predictable and honestly, I was glad to be done with it. I don't plan on continuing this series.

Comments

Fantastic Voyage by Isaac Asimov

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The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie.

"Arnold Spirit, Jr, or "Junior" as he's known on the Rez, does something no Spokane Indian has ever done. He enrolls in Reardon High School and begins the long and often painful process off navigating not only high school and adolescence but also being an outsider. Alexie handles it all with grace, humor and honesty. This was a great read. I would recommend it to anyone." 5 Stars Pros: Alexie handles the ups and downs of not only adolescence, but tragedy and loss in a stark, honest but gut wrenchingly relatable way. Cons: Some of Junior's all-consuming guilt, though understandable was a little repetitive but it's all part of being a teenager. Full Review: It all starts when Arnold Spirit Jr, or Junior, throws a textbook across the classroom. When he opened the book he saw his mother's name, her maiden name and it enrages him. He's furious that the reservation is so poor that they're learning from thirty-year old textbooks. He doesn't...

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