Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles #1)

 

By: Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl
Release Date: September 14th 2010 (first published December 1st 2009)
Publisher: VintageLittle, Brown Books for Young Readers
Series: Caster Chronicles
Rating: 1 out 5

 Ethan White is counting down the month until he can escape from Gatlin, South Caroline. During the count-down, he is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When new girl Lena Duchannes, niece of the town shut-in move into town. Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

Would their love story end in happier ever after or deadly ever after.

This is a rewrite of the review that I wrote, many months ago. I was not very happy on what I have wrote. So I never post it until now.

My thought on Beautiful creature is not very positive. The story follows some old dead beat formula: a paranormal/human pairing, uncovering of the ‘mysterious’ partner’s true nature, teens drawn to each other for some unknown reason, constant I can’t be with you because it’s dangerous back and forth, the inability to 'be together' physically.

It rares to in a young adult novel to have a male protagonist, but everything is still exactly the same. Now, though, instead of a girl-next-door type, you have a boy-next-door type who sails along in his faultlessness, constantly comparing himself to the less intelligent and morally-questionable beings he must interact with every day.

Then there is Lena, the love interest of Ethan. Her storyline is so boring. Lena droning on and on about how she’ll turn dark. She is as bad as Ethan.

One thing that annoys me is the way the authors teeter back and forth between Southern bashing and Southern glorification. I do not know where they stand, or where this book stands. Except, the complete lack of diversity and outright refusal to address non-white history makes me suspect the latter of the two.

The plot (or lack thereof) just seemed to drag on and on forever. So much so that at the end.

Beautiful Creatures is lackluster and predictable. In the end, I wondered why I bothered wasting my time on reading this book when there are so many other, more interesting things to do.