Toxic [Pretty Little Liars #15]

One A has been captured…but the most dangerous A of all is still out there in the penultimate installment in Sara Shepard's #1 New York Times bestselling Pretty Little Liars series. High school seniors Aria, Emily, Spencer, and Hanna barely survived their most recent encounter with A. And it's not over yet…. The police don't believe there's another, deadlier, A out there, but the girls know what-and who-they saw. If they don't track down this final tormentor soon, A will silence them forever. Sara Shepard's fan base continues to grow as ABC Family's hit Pretty Little Liars TV show draws in new readers to the #1 New York Times bestselling series. Full of unexpected twists and shocking revelations, the second-to-last novel ramps up the stakes for the jaw-dropping series conclusion in Pretty Little Liars #16.

And so it continues. The series that stole all of Sara Shepard's creative juices from The Lying Game. 

I'll admit it, it's true. I am. I swear Sara Shepard and P. C. and Kristin Cast need to get together and let their books have babies together. Because these series are getting ridiculously long.

Anyways, a majority of Toxic has a nice feel to it. Things seem to finally be going right in the girl's world. 

Aria got discovered in the art world after a famous art critic collector named Carruthers (I think that's what he was) buys her painting...the only downside is that it's a painting of Ali. (I should've seen it coming from that little detail.) Anyway, this art critic's name is so powerful soon Aria has a showing, her mom (who made the sale at the gallery she works at) has been promoted to assistant director and Aria is giving exclusives to different art magazines and blogs. 

One of them belongs to a guy named Harrison and because she's on the rebound from Noel and her most recent break-up and their love for art, she tries to move on. Noel tells her early in the book that he needs a break and starts dating this blonde Ali-clone bimbo named Scarlet. (Am I the only one who thinks that only girls with red hair should be named Scarlet?). Deep down Aria knows she isn't really feeling Harrison and she's most def. not over Noel. And he...Oh my God, this boy makes me so mad! 

At the climax of the book, Aria sees Noel and Scarlet at the Rosewood Rally's for Underprivileged Kids (How can you have a rally for something that doesn't exist in your area?) and runs away to the bathroom because she can't handle it. However, he bursts through the bathroom 

And they are all:

Then he's all, "I don't know what I want." Shaking my head; so like a guy. I wanted to slap him. Then, he leaves. 

After Aria's left in the bathroom alone, someone from the New York Post calls and tells her that the art collector who bought her painting, didn't really buy it. He's was in Africa during all of this and someone used his name. Aria starts freaking out as the tabloid reporter starts asking if she set up the whole scandal herself, which she denies. She asks him who the name of Carruther's assistant was and he tells her, Maxine Preptwill, (however you spell it) AKA the name Noel and Ali use to use to communicate. Ali set her up. 

However, this actually backfired. Instead of Aria leaving the art world in disgrace, it only made people more interested in her art. There were more people buying her painting and her mom knew she wasn't lying about setting her own-self up. Which I loved. Usually the parents in this series piss me the fuck off. Also, Noel showed up and told her he dumped the Ali-look alike I mean, Scarlet, and tells Aria he wants her back. She agrees.

Hanna's nice new life is due to a movie that she's been invited to join. Someone is re-doing the movie of the Liars lives. Instead of that terrible Lifetime-esqe movie Pretty Little Killers, there is now movie that will be played in theaters called Burn It Down. (I hated how the movie script matched the dialogue of the books word for word.) Although, she's been invited to play Naomi instead of her self, who is being played by a celebrity named Hailey Blake. She's just another typical friend-until-she's-not character. She's all buddy-buddy with Hanna and takes her out to a movie premiere. It's there that Hanna meets the guy playing her real life boyfriend, Mike. Who (of course) kisses her. And Hailey gets the whole thing on her camera. 

Everything's going fine until Hailey's bad portrayal of Hanna's character and her partying gets to her and she and the director get into it Megan Foxx style. With Hailey no longer playing Movie-Hanna, Movie-Mike tells her that she should go after the part. So she does, but Hailey is betrayed since Hanna did nothing but encourage her to leave the movie. To get her back she sends the picture of Hanna and Movie-Mike kissing to the real Mike, who, is understandably butt-hurt. 

Hanna is so stupid, she should've told Mike about the kiss as soon as possible. You would think by now, she and the other's would have learned that if you tell all your secrets, there's nothing anyone can hold over anyone's head. But of course, none of the Liars thinks like this. 

Mike and Hanna are temporarily in a fight until Hailey decides to be on Team Hanna again after she sees film of her acting for Burn It Down. She gives Hanna her blessing for the part and fixes things with her and Mike. I liked that her mom was actually trying in her relationship and it was kind of nice that Kate was Tweet-supporting Hanna's movie role. However, I was wondering about her dad and why he didn't try to reach out to her after her murder charges were dropped. Haha...well, seeing the end of Toxic this is probably a good thing for his career. But more about that later.

Spencer's story-line pissed me off because it pointed out a flaw in this books. I swear these girls be kissing-and-dissing boys (and girls) from one book to the next. I wish I could meet guys as fast as they do. Shoot, I'd never be single. Spencer starts a bullying forum website for people who are or have been bullied to share their stories. This is her claim to fame. She goes on TV shows and gets all this coverage for her site. We also learn that in Alison's wake a bunch of fans called Ali Cats have risen. This a cult of Ali-crazed, Ali-loving fanatics who believe she is brave, misunderstood and strong for enduring everything she has. Basically they're crazy.

One of the alleged Ali Cats named Dominick sends Spencer e-mails telling her she ain't shit and she doesn't know what she's talking about. At the same time, this other guy, Greg is sending Spencer messages telling her that he is thankful for everything she has done for him and the others and blah-blah-blah. When Spencer goes on TV, he shows up-and so does Dominick, who makes a scene at the bully shoot video. After, Spencer and Greg hang out and start liking each other. In the middle of their almost-first-kiss, Ali (or is it) shows up and messes it up. Spencer and Greg spend more time together and finally kiss. She finally gets to the point where she confesses that Ali is alive and no one believes her and literally everything they knew.

Like, Spencer, you just met this boy! It's not like you've known him for years or lived in the same town as him like Noel or Mike. And even some of those people aren't trustworthy! Let alone some damn stranger! At the Rosewood Rally's event, Aria tells Spencer about Ali setting up her art career just so she can fall. She's so upset that Greg notices and keeps pressing the issue so Spencer tells him what's up. Of course, Greg turned out to also be Dominck, meaning he was sending both e-mails to Spencer. The Dominick Spencer thought she had seen, was just a friend of his doing a favor. Greg turns out to be a Ali Cat employed by Ali himself. 

On second thought, maybe they should be together. So they can be stupid together. Ali doesn't let people who go blabbing her secrets live. Which is why Ali kills him at the end. 

Emily is the only one who had a terrible story-line. Like, her's was gut-wrenching. I'm starting to think that Sara and Pretty Little Liars the TV show are starting to play off each other. (If you want to see these TV spoilers, highlight the lines below. First, Noel knew Ali's secret in the books and he knew she was alive in the TV show. Maya gets killed off on the TV show and now Jordan is killed too.) Emily's notorious thief girlfriend and her lawyer have figured out a way to get her out a jail. Somehow, both times she was arrested, she conveniently wasn't read her Miranda rights and a bunch of other stuff. If everything goes as planned, Jordan will get out on parole, although she and Emily can't run away together. Either way, she and Emily make plans together. Just before this happens though, Emily has a run in with a Crazy Ali. Before this all of the Liars have been having great lives. No one's been getting any texts and even though they knew Ali is still out there, no one's had any runs with her.But then when Emily is doing laps at the pool when Ali shows up and is all, 

And Emily is all, Bitch, please. Ali gets mad and nearly drowns her by holding her down in the water. She makes some ominous threat then takes off. But Emily's not about to have it. She snatches Ali's hoodie off of her and inside is a receipt to a grocery store. 

Soon after this though, Emily tries to use Jordan's lawyer to patch her through to the prison and the lawyer callously gives her some bad news: Jordan's dead. One of her inmates killed her and escaped. The first thing Emily thinks is Ali. She refused to tell her she loved her because she had finally moved on with Jordan and in response, Ali killed her not her inmate. However, everyone thinks she's crazy. I'm not even sure how I felt about this until the inmate's body turns up too.

She is heartbroken and although her parents keep asking what's wrong, she doesn't tell them because she knows they won't care as much because Jordan was a criminal. She lies and claims that the bruises from her nearly death-by-Ali experience were self-inflicted and starts sleeping in the closet. Her mom tries to make her feel better by trying to set her up at the Rosewood Rally. Which I thought was a very nice gesture coming from the parents who sent her away because of her sexuality. But she also thought something very important. How many times does she have to get disowned by her parents before tragedy brings them back together? A compelling (and slightly convenient) question.

Emily and the others track down the store that the receipt came from. One of the cashiers drops this accidental hint about Ali which later gets her killed. The girls figure out that Nick, Ali's ex-boyfriend, and his family had a house in the area that's been vacant for a while. They go search in the area, but Ali is nowhere to be found although they smell her perfume. They decide to set up cameras in the area and take turns watching them. Emily goes on a secret rampage one day and destroys the house although she cleans up after herself but the cameras catch everything. Spencer sees who she thinks is Dominick checking out the area one day and tries to catch up, but he runs. She later finds out it was Greg who, specially wanted to know if there were cameras.

During the Rally, the girls get together and go back to the house. There they find blood everywhere and a sweater that they stupidly take with them (removing evidence? I kind of get it but at the same time it makes me so mad!) and a hastily cleaned up crime scene. They call the cops then leave and all spend the night at Emily's. The next morning, Agent Fuji shows up suddenly believing them that Ali is alive. Or rather was. They found Ali's blood, torture devices and her tooth at the house. They know about the cameras and several witnesses have seen them in the area. The Liars are accused of keeping and torturing Ali to death. They are all arrested.

Ha, I wonder how she feels since each of the girl's success ties back to her. The first painting Aria sold was of Ali. The movie that's putting Hanna on the map is about Ali. Spencer's bullying website is due to her experiences with Ali. I swear if the next book isn't the last I'm gonna scream! It can only end like Obsessed. It's the only way this can ever truly be over. 

Ali has to die.

Don't Look Back (Jennifer L. Armentrout)

Samantha is a stranger in her own life. Until the night she disappeared with her best friend, Cassie, everyone said Sam had it all-popularity, wealth, and a dream boyfriend. Sam has resurfaced, but she has no recollection of who she was or what happened to her that night. As she tries to piece together her life from before, she realizes it's one she no longer wants any part of. The old Sam took "mean girl" to a whole new level, and it's clear she and Cassie were more like best enemies. Sam is pretty sure that losing her memories is like winning the lottery. She's getting a second chance at being a better daughter, sister, and friend, and she's falling hard for Carson Ortiz, a boy who has always looked out for her-even if the old Sam treated him like trash. But Cassie is still missing, and the facts about what happened to her that night isn't just buried deep inside of Sam's memory-someone else knows, someone who wants to make sure Sam stays quiet. All Sam wants is the truth, and if she can unlock her clouded memories of that fateful night, she can finally move on. But what if not remembering is the only thing keeping Sam alive?

I was so excited about this book, I really was but it disappointed me. And it wasn't the plot (the main non-romantic plot was kick ass). Instead it was the bland characters and the writing that bored me and had me skimming this novel. Oh, god, not to mention the dialogue.

When Sam was like, "I'm so going to kill her," I was like,

Except for names, appearances and connections to other characters, there were no defining characteristics for any of the characters. What did Sam love to do other then shopping? What did she want to go to Yale to study? Did she have any new interests as New-Sam? What did Carson want to go to Penn State and study?Sam was the typical Mean Girl who used to rule her school There's nothing unique about her. She has a copy-cat near lookalike best friend, Cassie and a boyfriend that everyone covets. Of course Cassie and the boyfriend (Del) messed around behind Sam's back before she lost her memory. And Del is the typical good looking, rich, top athlete (in this case baseball) at her school. And a loser. Who the fuck sends pictures of their girlfriend going down on them around school-while she is your girlfriend? Are you trying not to ever get it again? And who the fuck takes him back?

Anyway, now that Sam is New Sam, she doesn't want to be like that anymore. She wants the friend she gave up (her brother's girlfriend Julie) back in exchange for Veronica, Candy but not Lauren (the nice one of her Mean Girls group). So she does this by getting pissed off at the Mean Girls for calling people fat and stopped dressing like a model. Not to mention she decides she wants Carson, who is the son of Sam's groundskeeper.

The plot though-the main plot was sooo interesting. I didn't give a crap about Carson and Sam's feelings for each other. That was obvious from Day One when she saw him and was so head-over-heels for him and thought he was her boyfriend. There was nothing unique about Carson except he's Mexican and good looking but that's it. Anyway, I started wondering if Don't Look Back was going to follow in the footsteps of Choker making the protagonist crazy and everything in her head. However, while she was a little crazy (understandable seeing the circumstances that caused the trauma in the first place) she didn't kill Cassie.

I had guessed from the times Sam had said that she and Cassie looked alike that they were going to somehow be related. Sam's parents aren't in love. The old money mom is embarrassed of her relationship with the scholarship Yale student she married. However, she doesn't want to divorce him because she doesn't want to be talked about. Anyway, Sam's dad had an one-night-stand with Cassie's mom at some point and she agreed to leave town with their daughter. That child would've fucked up his marriage especially seeing the pre-nup that is in place so he refused to acknowledge her. Later, Cassie and her mom come to town and somehow Cassie has found her birth certificate with her real dad's name on it (talk about amateurs). And goes all Wicked Witch of the West for the next couple of years.

               

The night in question, Cassie (for some random reason on this night) decides to set Sam up to hear the truth. She and Sam's dad meet up at the lake and fight as she begs him to be in her life. (Sad). But then she decides to blackmail him and he (accidently?) pushes her off the cliff where she dies. He doesn't know that Sam is there until she comes shooting out of the trees and slips and falls too. Her fucked up dad thinks they're both dead and leaves them there WITHOUT A CELL PHONE! Because he didn't want to lose the rich lifestyle he'd become accustomed too.

However, the trauma was great to Sam. She saw her best friend/secret sister get killed by her father and then nearly died afterwards. She hallucinated Cassie's killer in the back of her car which caused her to have a car accident. And all the notes she was getting, she was actually writing to herself.

I should've been able to figure out from the notes. Actually, no I shouldn't. I don't know why Sam was writing these notes to herself when they weren't helpful at all. They were vague (and stupid) enough to keep up the suspicion that it was someone else writing the notes to her.

#1) Don't look back. You won't like what you'll find.
#2) There was blood on the rocks. Her blood. Your blood.
#3) You know why she was at the lake.
#4) You know who killed Cassie.
#5) Don't let him know you remember anything.

Towards the ending, it seems like the author started rushing herself. The final memory of That Night which is broken up in two different chapters, is recounted to us as a story through Sam instead of a flashback like all the others we had seen. I really would've loved to hear the dialogue between Cassie and Sam's dad and to feel exactly what Sam was feeling. Not to mention what happened when she fell and hurt herself too. And why the heck did the dad take her phone? What made Cassie randomly decide to confront the dad that night out of all times.

Anyway, if you can get past the horrible dialogue (most high schoolers say ass not "butt"), the cardboard characters and the lack of interesting romance, I would recommend this book.

For the plot.

Strictly for the plot. 

Choker (Elizabeth Woods)

SUMMARY:  

Sixteen-year-old Cara Lange has been a loner ever since she moved away from her best and only friend, Zoe, years ago. She eats lunch with the other girls from the track team, but they're not really her friends. Mostly she spends her time watching Ethan Gray from a distance, wishing he would finally notice her, and avoiding the popular girls who call her "Choker" after a humiliating incident in the cafeteria. 

Then one day Cara comes home to find Zoe waiting for her. Zoe's on the run from problems at home, and Cara agrees to help her hide. With her best friend back, Cara's life changes overnight. Zoe gives her a new look and new confidence, and next thing she knows, she's getting invited to parties and flirting with Ethan. Best of all, she has her BFF there to confide in. But just as quickly as Cara's life came together, it starts to unravel. A girl goes missing in her town, and everyone is a suspect—including Ethan. Worse still, Zoe starts behaving strangely, and Cara begins to wonder what exactly her friend does all day when she's at school. You're supposed to trust your best friend no matter what, but what if she turns into a total stranger?

MY THOUGHTS:


This book was ugh. It was predictable and anti-climatic and unsuspenseful. I wanted to be creeped out and the mystery really be to a mystery but it wasn't. This book was a teen boring version of that movie with Johnny Depp, the Secret Window.

Very early on I figured out what was going on. It just seemed too predictable although the author was trying to make it a twist. At first I thought that Zoe was real but then I started thinking.

It's absolutely too much of a coincidence that crazy-Zoe just happened to show up the day that Cara is humiliated at school and gains the nickname "Choker".

Then after thinking about it I thought it was also too coincidental that Sydney dies after making fun of Cara. Of course it made sense if Zoe was really a crazed friend and everything but I started thinking it was all weird.

Then I remembered something that Cara had mentioned in the beginning about her parents hanging around everything when they first moved. Maybe she was crazy or something and her parents started hanging around more.

And it was weird that Cara kept talking to herself mentally about the murders/kidnapping and talking about Zoe. Then when she started smelling stinkiness and...by the time Ethan said that there was no one there when Zoe and Cara were fighting in the barn, I knew it.

But what the heck? What kind of cops let anyone on a crime scene anyway?

This book could've been so much more but it wasn't.

Seven Minutes In Heaven [The Lying Game #6]

So Ethan killed Sutton.

Because he was obsessively in love with her.

-_-

And he killed Nisha.

-_-

Because she read what REALLY happened in his file.
-_-

(He killed a girl when he was 10 for having another "best friend:)

Apparently, he had some psychological disorder (I really don't remember or care too) and when Emma found the file while she and Ethan were snooping in Nisha's deserted house, she (stupid girl!) ran to where he killed Sutton...and he tried to kill her too. But she got away...and the bad boy went to jail.

This book really had no purpose. I feel disappointed times A MILLION! The only interesting thing was when Sutton's body got found and she got busted by the cops for being Emma, her grandparents threw her out of the house (siting crazy-Becky's contagious as an excuse), she got kicked out of school (the reason being that Emma Paxton never enrolled/got into whatever school she'd been going too) and her friends ditched her...I felt like I was reading 90210 by the way everyone drove the innocent girl into the bad boys arms (I'm talking about Annie and that Jasper guy). But of course they all apologized and accepted her before giving Sutton a big salute at her funeral. Then after Emma spent her first Christmas with a family, Sutton passed on to the next life.

:( Poor Thayer. And that was the end.

Well, thanks Sara Shepard for devoting all your time to a zombified series (a series that was dead and came back to life when it should've stayed gone. Y'all know what I'm talking about.) It feels like she didn't even try with this series. Readers had guessed around book 2 or 3 (for some, even book 1) that Ethan was the killer. But they were counting on her signature to twist it out into being someone else.

But she didn't. Because she was too worried about PLL.

I guess I'm done with the Lying Game entirely now. First ABC Family cancels the show (which I loved) and now the disappointment that became the book series ended.

New Girl

• the plot of the book

The narrator, whose name is Callie although we learn that in the last couple of pages of the novel, is enrolled in a boarding school she lost interest in years ago for her senior year. She temporarily fell in love with the idea of boarding school after reading Harry Potter but quickly got over it when her chosen school rejected her. What Callie didn't know was that her parents wanted her to be happy so much that they kept resubmitting her application year after year despite her desire had been long forgotten. But she enters the school, M-something, long from wanted and we quickly discover why.

The reason Callie has finally managed to gain a spot in this school is because last year another girl enrolled...and disappeared. This girl, Becca, left a large (Alison DiLaurentis like) presence on the school despite her disappearance. The day Becca got on campus she managed to start a tradition of weekend parties in the school boathouse without any of the students getting caught and sleeping with the most unattainable guy on campus. Anyway, Becca was definitely loved and Callie was definitely not. Everyone immediately despises her for taking Becca's place especially their roommate, Dana. There are the typical mean girls but they're divided in half. There's the ones who are loyal to Becca's memory who warn Callie that Becca's past boy-toys, her ex-boyfriend Max and (I'm unsure of why they did this since they didn't know Becca and he were hooking up) Johnny. So, of course Callie falls for one of them, the ex-boyfriend, which feels purposeful. If Becca comes back, then she can be with Johnny and Callie can be with Max.

Not that anyone, especially Dana wants that to happen. Everyone is convinced that Becca will come back and until then, her so-called wannabe, Callie needs to stay away from everything that belongs to her. Dana even goes so far as to steal Callie's Halloween costume in order to get her into Becca's old Marilyn Monrue costume from last year to make everyone at school agree with her that Callie is just a Becca wannabe. Also, unnoteably so, Callie and Max have a series of enteractions and eventually they start sleeping together-without a title-which goes against everything Callie is trying to do. She wants to be viewed as herself which no one does, they all call her "new girl" and only see her as Becca's replacement. Too bad she did exactly what Becca did, sleep with Max without a title.

Anyway, half of the book is devoted to Becca's beginning junior year, a year ago that keeps in time with Callie's current senior year. In it we learn that Becca was a little psychotic. Although Becca starts dating Max, it's kind of something that she shrives to do because she doesn't want to be rejected and she wants to be the envied golden couple. Who Becca really wants is Johnny, who happens to have a thing for a roommate than Becca ruined on her first day. Eventually she gets Max to commit but keeps Johnny around on the hush. Towards the end of the novel, we discover that one of the rumors about Becca (that she was kidnapped, that she ran away, that she was murdered...etc) is true; she was pregnant. Not that we get to know who the baby daddy is. Becca ends up so drugged up, but she tries to convince Johnny to be with her not knowing that Dana is eavesdropping. Johnny drugs her up more to try and calm her down but all the drugs in her system cause Becca to end up drowning. Dana saw her on the dock but was the person who believed the most that Becca was alive.

Then everyone graduates, Max and Callie end up together and presumably go to college in the same town or near each other (I don't know what towns Boston University and Harvard are in) and Becca's mom turns out to be pregnant. The End.

• my thoughts on the book

This book was properly named although I don't like the wisp of premise on the cover. What if no one knew your name? It completely misdirects the direction that the novel is actually going to go. New Girl doesn't explore the idea of someone who the people around her don't know the name of. Instead, it explores the idea of replacing someone else against your will so much so, that everyone refuses to acknowledge your name but rather the action of replacement. I felt or understood most of Callie's feelings about being thrust into Becca's shadow so much. And it's one thing to be always cast in Becca's shadow by her peers but by the guy she likes too...that must suck.

However, New Girl doesn't truly belong in the mystery category. Sure, there's a mystery but every clue that we should've gained by sleuthing, Callie's sleuthing, was told to us by Becca's third person sections of the book. It was so anti-climatic and un-interesting although informative. The most suspenseful part of the entire novel was when Becca showed up as a hallucination? (This part was unclear because Callie wasn't asleep  unlike the later times she runs into Becca). At that point in time it wasn't known of Becca was alive or not.

Anyway, everything that could've been done with this book was tossed aside. It was anti-climatic. The romance was soooo uninteresting. I was more invested in Johnny and Becca than Callie's romance with Max (in which neither of them learned anything about one another that didn't somehow relate to the Becca mess). And I started to believe that Dana had killed Becca and was succumbing to guilt or was going off the deep-end but that all turned out to be post-traumatic stress symptoms probably due to Dana seeing Becca on the dock as/or the results of her rape, which she confided in Becca about that made her so loyal  to her. But instead Becca just died, pregnant and drugged up. This book, now that I think about it was soooo disappointing. 

Another Little Piece (Kate Karyus Quinn)

Another Little Piece is about the return of a girl named Annaliese to her hometown after disappearing a little under a year ago after trading her soul for the lust of her crush, Logan, the running back on her school football team. However, what she didn't realize is that she got cheated in more ways then one. As soon as she gives it up to Logan in the woods, she tells him he loves her and he pretends not to hear as he goes back to the party they're at. 

But it sucks for Annaliese because now she's lost everything and she's given up her soul for a boy who has what he wanted. Anna, the name of the one Annaliese gives her soul too, tells Annaliese she has to pay now. So Annaliese cuts Anna's heart out of her current body and then eats it, not realizing that in doing so she has given Anna control of her body. 

However, something goes wrong when the body Anna-is-currently-in's mother shows up and messes up the ceremony spiraling into a series of events that leads to Anna's memory loss and the beginning of the novel.

When Anna-as-Annaliese returns she runs into every love interest she's going to have in a record amount of time. Lucky for us though, it's never any contest who she has feelings for or any kind of love triangle. 

Eric/Franky is the creepy loser who manipulated Anna into her more than nine-lives years ago who insists that he loves her and she'll give in to moving onto the next body when the hunger for a new body takes over her. Apparently, the first time she switched bodies, it took over her and she killed her original family. 

There's Logan, whose role in the climax I should've seen coming but missed. I think that the lust may have evolved into something else because the first time Anna-as-Annaliese runs into him, he drunkingly reveals his guilt of taking her virginity and leaving her in the woods in front of the whole school turning her from a poor-victim into a home-wrecking whore.

Eventually, Logan becomes prey to Eric/Franky when he wants Annaliese's love and gives up his body and soul for it. 

And then there's Dex, the boy next door who's not as normal as you might think. Dex can see people's deaths and saw Annaliese's years ago, therefore recognizing that she is someone else not that that stops him from developing feelings for her.

I liked this book for a number of reasons.  I enjoyed how the author took a step away from the Twilight formula. I loved the romance factor. Anna and her love interest, Dex never say "I love you" to each other in the book. They never become creepily obsessed with each other or even get anywhere close to having those I-love-you feelings. And there's something about Dex that makes him so much more compelling then most YA love interests especially the paranormal versions. 

I also liked that it was a standalone novel instead of the author being greedy and trying to bank off of a series of books. And I also enjoyed that not every mystery of the book was wrapped up at the end. We didn't really learn about why the Physician was who he was and did what he did or about his sisters. But I'm glad we didn't because not everything had to be wrapped up at the end although I am curious but I feel like the explanation concocted wouldn't live up to the standards of the mystery.

This book was nothing like I thought it was going to be. But that is a good thing. I thought it was a realistic, suspenseful mystery and while it was two-thirds of those things, it also had supernatural tones too. And not the supernatural tones most books have. This book was actually dark and that was part of the reason I enjoyed it. Now-and-days most paranormal, supernatural books try to follow the success that Stephenie Meyer discovered with a Twilight-esque formula and everything but switch the new girl for the boy boy or the supernatural entity being the girl instead of the boy and blah-blah-blah. This novel was far from Twilight and I loved that about it.

The Evolution of Mara Dyer [Mara Dyer #2]

I know they say that Denial is the first stage of grief, but c'mon people, Noah is so not dead. That crazy Kells lady has every reason to lie to Mara. For one, after losing the one person who she loved AND believed her, it makes Mara more susceptible to whatever Kells wants. So stop crying!

And yay! Finally the mystery is somewhat solved. Book/Volume One left with the reader unsure if Mara was really crazy after all or if she did have some kind of deadly power. 

In Book/Volume Two it's revealed its Option Number Two! And we learned that Noah and Mara are intertwined in more than just body and soul but through their families history somewhat.

And yayyyyy! The author didn't fall prey to second-book-in-a-trilogy-filler disease! Because stuff actually happened. Revealing that whatever the heck is going on it is soooo much bigger then just Jude and Mara. I just wish I understood more what the flashbacks to the Jungle have to do with anything and what Mara's grandma and Noah's mom have to do with it and how did they know each other but I'm sure that the author won't have A Series of Unfortunate Events-syndrome and leave no stone/mystery unturned.

:D

And the story just gets more suspenseful but now it's time for Mara to stop falling apart and start really kicking some ass. Starting with Dr. Kells (talk about ultimate control freak) and ending with psychotic-ass Jude.