Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Series: Beautiful Creatures, #1
Published December 1st 2009 by Little, Brown and Company
Genre: Young Adult, Romance, Paranormal
563 pages
Format: eBook
Source: Purchased
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
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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.
Review
I watched the film adaptation of this book a long time ago and the only thing I can remember was how bored I was watching it. That said, I wasn’t really expecting a lot when I decided to read this story. It started… hmmm… fine. But I think I like the writing style, actually, it gets better as you read it. Plus, this story was taken from the hero’s POV which I find really interesting (the heroine only has 1 chapter taken from her own POV).
The first half of the story was, as I’ve said is fine, but when I reached the middle, I started to feel really agitated because of the mystery. Plus, I am also loving the spooky vibe. I guess that explains the book cover eh? *wink. I love paranormal stories but this one didn’t really get into me until the second half. And speaking of the second half, it was really so frustrating and so intense. Frustrating because of the absurd people in the town of Gaitlin acting like a child bullying a teenage girl just because she’s an outsider. And intense because of the action and confrontation especially in the last two or three chapters of the book.
Aside from the mystery and action, Beautiful Creatures didn’t fail on the romance part. Well, I always love YA romance anyway so that wasn’t a surprise at all, *wink. But still, I think for this series, the one that really stood up to me the most was Ethan’s big love for Lena. It was so pure and so true that he’ll risk everything just for her, isn’t that just sweet?
As for the main characters, I actually like Ethan. He has some issues of his own but he didn’t let those issues control his life. I don’t remember ever hating his character even a little bit while reading this story, all his actions were warranted and I just salute his devotion for Lena.
And for Lena, I actually feel sorry for her character during the first half of this story especially the bullying. The bullying was really absurd considering that her Uncle’s ancestors were the first one who lived in Gaitlin, so technically, she’s not a total outsider at all. Her character is fine by me but I just hated how she always seems to give up when the situation gets tough, good thing Ethan never gave up on her.
The side characters were a combination of cliché but I let that pass when I reached the intense chapters! Man! That was really unexpected. I also love that this story didn’t leave us hanging but instead giving us an idea what will happen on the next instalment.
Overall, I think it was a good start of the series. For now, I am giving this story a 3.5 star.
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