Thursday, June 21, 2012

Sweetly--a Book Review.

*WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS ALL SORTS OF SPOILERS. DO NOT READ ON UNLESS YOU HAVE READ SWEETLY AND/OR DON'T MIND READING THE SPOILERS*


Hello. Today I would like to do a book review on Sweetly, by Jackson Pearce. To anyone who hates reading reviews, I don't blame you--mostly because I hate reading reviews, too.  But here I am, reviewing. 

Am I what people would call a hypocrite? 

I don't know. I'm too tired right now to care. 

But let's get on with this review. To me, it was okay. It wasn't as good as its first book, Sisters Red The pacing was a little off and some of the parts were too creepy even for me *cough cough Fenris eating certain girl in front of main character cough cough.*

It starts out with Gretchen and Ansel out in the woods with Gretchen's twin sister, looking for the Witch; some evil old hag prowling in the woods and searching for little children to devour. Gretchen's twin sister gets eaten, to say the least.

Now, about a decade later, Gretchen and Ansel are driving down a North Carolinan road because their step mom has kicked them out of the house. They end up in a small town called... SaidTown... and they meet a nice young lady named Sofia Kelly, who Ansel takes an immediate liking to and eventually starts dating. 

They stay in Sofia's house (which is also a chocolate shop called Sweet Crumblier) because this is a fictional book, and in fictional books you always stay with the person you just meet out of the blue.

There's also this guy named Samuel, who hunts werewolves and rides a motorcycle. 

Gretchen finds out that 'the Witch' who ate her sister was actually a werewolf (or a Fenris, as they are called in the book), and there are werewolves on her tail or something. Anyway, she turns to Samuel because he knows how to shoot a gun and therefore can teach her how to stay alive, and because this is a fictional book he doesn't say no and starts teaching her how to shoot. 

After a while Gretchen and Samuel start to hunt these Fenris down, killing them off as revenge for murdering Gretchen's little sister. But because Jackson Pearce publishes traditionally she had to pair up Gretchen and Samuel eventually, and so the two become more than just friends. 

.... Which is where I'm going to stop with this review because this is what I mainly wanted to talk about.

To me, I didn't see the relationship curveball because from the very beginning I was determined that Gretchen and Samuel were not going to get together. Period. It happens in every single YA book that I read; the main girl (who isn't good looking) ends up with the strong, sensitive, good-looking guy. Always. And so--stupid me--I was convinced that this book was different, that the only romance would be between Ansel and Sofia (who--spoiler!--kills eighteen year old girls to try to bring back her twin sister and inevitably dies when her house burns down).

Gretchen and Samuel were supposed to remain friends. They were perfect friends. And Jackson and/or her publisher knew that the book wouldn't sell unless they hooked up.

I think I'm tired of YA books. They're too predictable.

Overall: 3.5/5 stars

Creepy aspects: 6/5 stars

Plot hole cover ups: 2/5 stars

Relationships: 0.5/5 stars (You can do better, Ansel.)

No comments: