Fallen (Fallen, #1)

by Lauren Kate

[celinenyx]

Seventeen-Year-Old Luce is a new student at Sword & Cross, an unwelcoming boarding/reform school in Savannah, Georgia. Luce's boyfriend died under suspicious circumstances, and now she carries the guilt over his death with her as she navigates the unfriendly halls at Sword & Cross, where every student seems to have an unpleasant - even evil - history. Her history is no stranger to evil as it involves the 'shadows' that have plagued Luce since childhood and always appear when something bad is going to happen.

It was a nice book. Sword & Cross was positively gloomy, both Cam and Daniel were incredibly sexy, Penn was sweet, Luce is credibly emotional messed up and the shadows kinda creeped me out after a while. The angel thing was subtly done and not rushed. You can see Luce starting to admit the truth; she wasn't normal anyway.

To me it felt a bit like Twilight, how it should have been. Light, fast, a smooth read that leaves you wanting for more. And with real danger, not just some sparkly sparkly "marble" vampires that think themselves to be the shit. If you think about it, no one ever got hurt in Twilight. I like that Lauren Kate took a little risk here and ventured to kill off some of the characters that we really liked. It fits the story nicely.

(Spoiler)
I can't help but compare Miss Sophia to Rebel Angels' Miss Moore. It was more of a shock in Rebel Angels, but the betrayal of an older person the protagonist confided in felt similar. And in both cases, I liked not everyone is to be trusted.

Nice love story and good young-adult book.