Fallen

Fallen, by Lauren Kate

Lucinda Price is sent to a reformatory school after a suspicious fire kills a boy in her class.  Here she meets a bunch of crazy people, including two boys, Cam and Daniel.  Cam is instantly nice to her and Daniel is a jerk.  Of course she likes Daniel best.

But the school kids are all dysfunctional and have wierd secrets.  And Luce has dreams about wings and flying and bright lights and sees scary shadows during the day, coming to get her.  Come to find out the secrets involve fallen angels, a 100 years battle between good and evil, and an old rule that angels can't fall in love with humans; ever.  Lest the powers that be get mad and the human dies.

So, as with all things YA lately, this is a triology (mayhap a series?  I think there are four?).  And that always makes the first book feel like a preface chapter, versuses a stand alone book.  Word to publishers: please quit taking books that only need one and turning them into three.  You artificially lengthen them and we, the readers, know it.

That being said, Fallen was good.  Not Harry Potter good, or even Twilight good, but good.  I didn't care for the way the author spelled the peoples names (how would you pronounce Arriane? Or even Luce?  Is that Luc-y?  Or Luce as in Loose?).  But the plot was inventive.  The common criticism I've read is that nothing happens until the final two chapters.  Sort of true.  Nothing is resolved.  In fact, I have more questions at the end of the book than I did in the middle.  Is Cam a good guy?  Or a bad guy?

But, like I said, it's a triology.  Torment is already out, and Passion comes out in June.  If I can get them from the library (how I read Fallen) I'll continue.  If not ...