Evermore

I don't recall where I happened across a review of Evermore, but, anywho, it got compared to Twilight, only slightly more racy. And I was like, Alright. I'm in.

There are some quite amusing reviews on Amazon arguing about whether it's better or worse than Twilight, but what's clear is this book is obviously heavily influenced by our friend Stephanie Meyer. It was as if the author, Alyson Noel, read Twilight and said, "I can do better than that." And then did mildly better than that.

Ever, the 16/17 year old protagonist, moves to California to live with her Aunt after her family is killed in a car accident. She quickly locks eyes with Damen and finds herself inextricably drawn to him. Turns out, Damen has a secret - seems like he's hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of years old, and to prove it, he does some creepy old-man tricks like pulling flowers from behind girl's ears. Sound familiar?

(One of) the weird things about Twilight is that Edward and Bella are really crazy about each other even though neither one has anything to be crazy about. They're both boring, unlikable characters with little personality outside chuckling and clumsiness. In Evermore, the main characters are only slightly more interesting, but at least Ever has some talents of her own - she can read minds and see auras, and, she also sees her sister - a ghost who died in that car crash.

Yes, but how racy is it, you ask? Well, not very. Anyone looking for the broken beds and bruises (ick) of Breaking Dawn will be disappointed. Ever and Damen kisss and she dribbles off those bobby brooks, but panics when he goes for her undies. Then this happens:

And when it's clear he has no plans to continue I say, "You know, it would really be nice if you'd stop talking in code, finish a sentence, and tell me what the heck is going on. Because all I know is that Evangeline is dead, Haven's wrist is a red oozing mess, you ditched me at the beach because I wouldn't go all the way, and now you're breaking up with me."

That was the first of two passages that made me laugh, although I'm pretty sure it wasn't intentional.

Here's the other one... Eventually Damen explains that he's an "immortal" and so is Ever, sort of. Also, she's been reincarnated a bunch of times and they always fall in love. He even explains how he pulls all those flowers out of mid-air:

He smiles. "Manifesting. Same way you made the elephant, and this beach. It's simple quantum physics."

Ah, yes! Quantum physics!

I picked up the second book in the series, Blue Moon, but I don't think I'll read it. Well. Skim it. Maybe.

Curse of the Wolf Girl

When we were on vacation in France, I read Curse of the Wolf Girl while husband read the first two Hunger Games books. Not surprisingly, we both finished pretty quickly, then were tortured by all those fabulous French book stores and book stalls along the river full of French books we can't read.

Curse of the Wolf Girl is the anxiously awaited follow-up to Lonely Werewolf Girl by Martin Millar. A bit too long awaited, for me and my bad memory, because I had no recollection of how that book ended.

This second novel continues the story of Kalix and her family, as well as her rag-tag group of well-meaning, goofy, goth roommates (including the nearly-adopted niece of Malveria the Fire Queen, my favorite character.) It was really funny and caused me to laugh out loud frequently and entertain an ungrateful husband to whom I like to read against his will. It's also packed-full of adventure and fights which I don't ever recall enjoying reading before. Is this a new dawn, I thought, of enjoying "action" books? I asked husband. "What do you mean, action? You never read action books before?"

"Not like this," I said, as I read aloud the following:

Malveria smiled. She took a step forward to address the Fire Elementals who remained at her side. All around were the bodies of fallen comrades. "Gentlemen." She raised her voice over the sound of the thunderous fire. "We are fortunate. It is rare that the opportunity presents itself to perform great deeds of valor that will be talked about in ages to come. We will advance, dispatch the enemy, and return in triumph to let the bards sing songs about us. If any of you would rather not participate in this glorious victory, please feel free to withdraw."

God help me if I didn't pick up the first to Evermore books from the library that I heard are like the new Twilight. Well, sort of - there are some rather hilarious reviews on Amazon that greatly debate whether it's better or worse. Ie. "This series is just as good as Twilight saga!!!!!" and "Evermore is basically Twilight, only much more poorly written, with a dash of "quantum physics", a pinch of a glossed-over theory of reincarnation, and a dollop of The Secret for good measure." Oooo - burrrrrnnn. Well, I'll let you know soon. Right now I'm deep in the throes of the Satanic Verses so I think it will be just the thing to cleanse my palate when I'm done.