blacjuel Female, 29, Single. USA

Omg. I was so bored! What is it with Cruz and her pointless first hundred and so pages? Seriously, she needs directions to get to a point! It is impossible for me to recount the amount of times I wanted to gouge my eyes out. Sorry De La Cruz but I was deja bored for half the entire novel.

What's really frustrating about it is that this story has so much potential but all of it is half wasted on mini subplots about spoiled rich high school kids. Her idea that vampires are fallen angels trying to redeem themselves is brilliant and innovative but all the time she wastes on modeling, shopping and fashion brings you crashing down to your knees in boredom.

Another thing is that three books into the series and I feel detached from all of her characters. There is not one of them that I particularly care for. If they were all killed in the blink of an eye I wouldn't even flinch. I especially do not like Schuyler no matter how hard I try. I find her annoying, selfish and flighty. For such a new vampire soul she sure doesn't care to read about her history even when the readings are assigned to her for her own good. She doesn't even have to do the research, the books are handed to her and still she doesn't read them. But yet she asks a million dumb questions that if she read she'd have the answers to.

The only clever thing Cruz does (if you keep trudging on and which earned this book it's 3rd star) is that she knows how to end each novel with a fantastic cliffhanger that keeps you intrigued enough to want to read the sequel. I mean in the last fifty pages how brilliantly does everything come together? So brilliantly!! Very reminiscent of J.K. Rowling's talent and ingenuity throughout the Harry Potter series. But honestly at the first sign of boredom in the next book, I'm out because I cannot bear to sift through another two hundred pages of crap only to find the real treat on the last fifty

After my slight disappointment with The Pact I think I sort of put my guard up with regards to Jodi Picoult novels. Fortunately, I was pleasantly surprised with this one. I really enjoyed reading this novel and got very attached to some of the characters, especially Anna.

The book is written in multiple first person with each chapter dedicated to one character point of view at a time. At first I hated that the one character's point of view we never got to see things from was Kate's. But by the end I came to understand and accept why, plus it made sense and fit well with how she told her story. Speaking of points of views, I hated reading from Sara's point of view at times and I was torn between criticizing her and empathizing with her. But for the most part empathy won, though I definitely would have handled my mothering duties in a completely different manner than she did.

I think everything about this books is brilliant and I loved it from start to finish. I wouldn't change a thing! A+ This makes me rather excited to pick up another Picoult book though I am still going to proceed with caution while hoping to be as pleasantly surprised as I was with this one.

This is one of those books that you've never heard of or seen before but while browsing through the YA section in the library the title just catches your attention. That is how I discovered this book and I'm glad I did. It was a good story and a perfect start for my 2010 reading list.

Marr has a great imagination and created a brilliant and unique world. My first ever faery tale and I had a fun reading it. Of course at times it felt like the story dragged on but I can't be sure of whether this was because of the start, stop, start, stop way in which I read it (because I was in the middle of moving from one house to another not because it was boring). In fact despite the interruptions I think the story is very well paced, the writing is simple and makes for a quick and easy read. I found her descriptions so vibrant that I could easily see this story being transformed to film.

I gave it 3.5 stars because I feel she lost most of the story's potential due to wanting to create an air of mystery. There are a lot of questions unanswered (which I hope is because there are 2 or 3 other books in the series) and plenty of missing reactions or emotions to the things that were revealed. Things I felt she could have been handled better.

Regardless of these errors I still enjoyed the story enough to anticipate reading the other books in this series. And now that my interest in faery tales is awakened I'm excited to see what other authors have to offer on the topic.