Tagged: cults
Awake by Natasha Preston
(Cover courtesy of Goodreads.)
Scarlett doesn’t remember anything before the age of five. Her parents say it’s from the trauma of seeing her house burn down, and she accepts the life they’ve created for her without question—until a car accident causes Scarlett to start remembering pieces of an unfamiliar past.
When a new guy moves into town, Scarlett feels an instant spark. But Noah knows the truth of Scarlett’s past, and he’s determined to shield her from it…because Scarlett grew up in a cult called Eternal Light, controlled by her biological parents.
And they want her back.
[Full disclosure: I requested and received a free ebook copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]
One of the things that sort of bugs me when I read YA (or really anything in the urban fantasy genre) is that a lot of the main characters find out about magic from someone else. Usually there’s a token skepticism that’s quickly washed away at the slightest hint that the other person might be right. But what happens when a main character doesn’t believe in magic because there really is no magic? Instead, there’s just a bunch of crazy people in a cult that want to sacrifice her in an insane attempt at immortality.
While I like the general idea for the story quite a bit, Awake was disappointing in that it followed all of the usual high school romance tropes. A more popular best friend that the main character slut-shames? Check. New guy in school conveniently has the same schedule as the main character? Check. They live reasonably close together and are sat together on the first day of classes so they get to know each other? Check and double check. And then they fall into a cheesy teen romance that develops over the course of a week? Yep. I think we’ve hit almost all of the main high school tropes and that’s what really drags this book down. Natasha Preston has a great premise with some very interesting insights into the psychology of cults but it’s just lost in the horde of clichés dumped on you right in the beginning. It’s really sad in that respect.
Scarlett is an unremarkable narrator. She says it’s weird that she doesn’t have memories before the age of four and everyone around her seems horrified at the idea. But in the real world? People would go, “Oh, that’s weird” and move on with their lives, not try to get her to see a therapist and bend over backwards to find those ‘lost’ memories. Most people I know don’t have memories from before they were around the age of 3 or closer to 4 so I really don’t see how unusual that is. It’s sort of like Preston was trying to create suspense where there was none instead of focusing on creating suspense in a more believable way. Other than her weird fixation about not having memories from before she was 4, Scarlett doesn’t stand out at all. She doesn’t really have any notable hobbies or interests other than Noah once she meets him. She’s just boring. Noah is a little more interesting because of his Eternal Light background and his conflicted feelings about love versus duty but other than that he’s a pretty stereotypical love interest. Generically attractive, somewhat athletic and of course a little bit sheltered. The perfect boring boy for the perfect boring girl.
As I said earlier, what I did like about the book is that Awake did have a great premise in theory. I love that Natasha Preston sort of takes the trope of the narrator discovering they have an amazing background and turns that on its head. It’s really refreshing after a string of fairly decent YA novels with the same boring premise of “girl discovers she has magical powers from a boy who was sent to save her”. Although I don’t want to give too many plot points away, once we actually meet the members of the Eternal Light cult, it’s very interesting from a psychology perspective. They engage in highly complex rituals and they’re almost completely beholden to their leaders under threat of violence. Most people don’t seem to need violence to conform, however, as they’re very glad to have a purpose in life. Even if it means sacrificing another human being.
In the end, Awake was a fairly decent book ruined by too many clichés and predictable plot twists. It had a great premise that got lost in that avalanche of tropes and while there was some suspense near the end of the novel, I never felt especially compelled to turn the page to find out what happened next. Really, it was just boring and unremarkable. Another book that you may read once and then completely forget a few hours after reading it. It wasn’t terrible and it wasn’t great; it was just in that middle ground that leaves you feeling unsatisfied.
I give this book 3/5 stars.
Spelled by Kate St. Clair
(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)
Magic runs thicker than blood.
Misfortune seems to follow the Sayers family. Georgia has tried endlessly to reestablish normality since her mother died, and she’s no closer from escaping her strange past when a mysterious fire destroys the only other high school in her tiny Texas town. Georgia is thrown into the company of Luke, a cryptic senior who brings her face to face with the truth about her heritage. Her loving, perfect mother created her family for the singular purpose of birthing five of the most powerful witches in the world, capable of terrifying magic. Now that she knows the truth, can Georgia keep her siblings safe?
Who is behind the dark cult that’s after her family? And does Luke know more about her powers than even she does?
[Full disclosure: I received a free print book through Masquerade Tours’ Reader Round-Up program in exchange for an honest review.]
One of the things that initially attracted me to Spelled was not the cover, but the blurb. It’s pretty common to have a girl that doesn’t fit in living in a small town as a main character but a seemingly evil (but now dead) mother? Four siblings all possessing unusually strong magical powers due to selective breeding? That sounded a lot more unique than your typical YA novel so I decided to give it a try.
I was far from disappointed in the characters. Georgia isn’t the most unique character ever but she stands out from a crowd and Kate St. Clair has made her a three dimensional, believable character. She loves her family to death and will do anything to protect her siblings, especially from the legacy of their mother, who was nearly burned alive as a witch in the modern day. We don’t know much about her mother in the beginning but as the story goes on and the tension and sense of foreboding ratchet up we learn far more about the Sayers family’s sordid past. What’s interesting about Spelled is that St. Clair decided to show us a lot of the developments that caused Georgia to change but we don’t really see that gradual change (that happens more off-screen). Instead, we’re shown how she is later and while it makes sense considering how short the book is, it was a little disappointing for someone like me who likes to see a little more on-screen character development.
The plot was okay in general but it was pretty typical. A girl in a small town meets a hot guy who seems to already know her/like her and they get to know one another and he eventually reveals to her that she’s special, i.e. she has powers of some sort. I don’t mind that plot if there’s some variation but Kate St. Clair really didn’t have all that much variation within that typical plot arc. That was the sort of disappointing element of the story for me. I expected something a little more unique, a little more imaginative. Still, it was fast-paced and although I sort of predicted the ending, I didn’t predict everything that happened in the end.
The world-building was actually fairly decent. In Spelled at first you think the Sayers family has pretty typical witch powers but that’s not necessarily true. They were created to be powerful and they are powerful but they’re not completely the same as the average witch you’ll encounter in YA. Because the book is so short and they don’t know they’re witches from the start we don’t get to learn as much about them as I’d like but I saw enough that I can say I understood the essentials of how their powers worked and why they didn’t show up earlier. Again, considering the fact that Spelled is quite a short novel (and the author does call it a novella), Kate St. Clair did a pretty good job with her world-building.
Essentially, Spelled is an okay book. It’s not the greatest I’ve ever read but it’s certainly not the worst. It’s pretty much in the middle of the two extremes and if you like YA stories featuring witches, I would recommend it for you.
I give this book 4/5 stars.