Book Review - Beautiful Creatures

Beautiful Creatures
Author: Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl
Series: Caster Chronicles #1
Genres: Paranormal, Urban Fantasy | Young Adult
Release Date: 14th September 2010
Publishers: Little Brown
No. Pages: 563
Source: Gifted
Rating: 
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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.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, but sadly, little things really all became too much, and in the end, I couldn't give it the full 5 stars, even if I wanted to.

This was the first collaboration book I'd ever read, and I guess I was pleasantly surprised by the outcome. I had always imagined collaboration books to be slightly disconnected, and possibly not as free flowing as others written by one author, but this one was always at a steady pace, even slow at times, but generally, really consistent.

Having really broken into the fantasy genre lately with the last few books I've read, I felt quite at ease with this storyline and plot and felt that I could quite easily fall in and out of the story when I had to put it down. Where possible however, this book was not put down, and every spare minute of the day I had, was spent reading this. The storyline was surprisingly different to some others in the same genre and because of this, intriguing; the general ambience and atmosphere of the story was much stronger and darker than others of the same category, and I really liked it. Another feature that I enjoyed was the different perspective of the story, from a males point of view than a females. For the genre, and the synopsis, I really expected your typical 'girl falls in love with mysterious guy, things happen, they live happily ever after' and although this book does follow some of that trait, it was nice to experience it from the other viewpoint. It also made a lovely change for the male protagonist to be pinning over the female, rather than the other way round, but, I think because of said males characteristics and overall personality, I really felt no empathy towards him at all, throughout the story, which is both upsetting and disappointing, as I expected a little more considering the hype surrounding this book. As is the same however with a lot of other readers who've reviewed this, I do believe that there were too many pages for the story, and that if some hadn't been included, it wouldn't have been much loss, if any, to the plot itself.

The little things in the book that really niggled at me and honestly resulted in me deducting a star consisted of cliché attributes and the relationship between both the main characters. To start with, I really feel that authors in the fantasy genre are losing the ability to come up with a new physical appearances to their female characters. In the last 3 books I've read alone there's been at least one young lady, with jet black hair that covered an eye of either bright or emerald green colour, and another, with pure blonde hair and striking blue eyes. I completely sympathise with the authors only having access to a specified number of genetic outcomes, but really, must every book have these typical descriptions; I really don't think so. Along with new, fresh appearances, I feel changes must be made elsewhere, especially to surroundings. I honestly feel that environments are now being repeated too, especially the cliché 'haunted house', or the 'weird groupie neighbourhoods'. Can nothing just be used once anymore, or even twice, instead of time after time after time? I fear not. The final straw when it came to deducting the 5th star was just how often the relationship in this story was on and then off. I understand that all relationships go through rough patches, and arguments commence, but must every tiff result in a kissing frenzy on either teenagers bed, or cuddles so intermingled that it physically sounds uncomfortable to read, let alone be in? I am yet to find a relationship in the fantasy genre that isn't all about their tension, the 'electricity between them' or their aching to hold and be around and with each other, which is really disappointing.

Generally, I really enjoyed this book. It was likable, and story believable in the genre, and I intend to read the next installment of the series quite soon.