[REVIEW] Hallowed by Cynthia Hand

Hallowed by Cynthia Hand
Published: January 2012
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: Unearthly #2

Second time's the charm for me and this book! After re-reading Unearthly, [REVIEW HERE], I found myself absorbed in the series again and proceeded to start Hallowed from the beginning and give it another try. Honestly I'm not sure why I even stopped last time since I was already more than half way through the book but I did and completely forgot about it. And so I read it again and enjoyed it much more then the first time.

Once again it's the love triangle between Clara, Tucker and Christian. I feel like Cynthia Hand is giving each boy their deserved amount of pages because I found Hallowed to focus more on Christian than Tucker. I guess that's fair since Tucker got the most of Unearthly.

Also, once again, we have these visions that the characters have. Although I'm not really sure if they can even be called visions anymore...more like glimpses into the future. I'm slightly confused about the premise of this evolving idea because at first I was like "cool. nephilim children get visions when they're older that is basically their sole purpose of being on Earth. that's cool" and now it just doesn't seem like that. Before the visions came at certain specific moments when part of the vision was coming together. And now they just come sporadically and it's not really a purpose. Does that make sense? Cause if it doesn't don't worry, I'm kind of confused too...

Clara and the other nephilim adolescents get introduced to the angel world formerly in this book in the form of a camping trip. They get introduced to many more adult angels and get told a shocking secret (which I think is a spoiler and to keep this spoiler free I won't be saying anything. Go read the books!) The nephilim adolescents (i.e. Clara, Christian, Jeffrey and Angela) come together and create this lovely Angel's Club which I find to be completely useless when it comes to the story plot but I guess they had to get together somehow. Clara also gets a blackwing stalker (I wasn't that surprised) that kind of becomes her friend (Not really a friend but kind of...and a kind-of friend sounds better than stalker). Also did I mention that Christian and Clara are apparently (a big APPARENTLY) "soul mates"? Why you ask? Oh they just share this special bond and all these visions. That definitely makes people soul mates. Imagine someone said this to you: "Hey, not to scare you or anything but, I saw you in a vision and I get weird feelings around you. I think we're soul mates." Doesn't that sound strange? Oh well, soul mates are meant to be together. Right? I hope I'm right.

I found the story lacking in the development in any other character but Clara and Christian. There are just pivotal scenes in the story that came at a surprise for me, mainly because I didn't understand the character well enough to understand why they would say this or act like that. I understand the need for his love triangle to play out but it's getting a bit too much, and this is coming from someone who's a die hard romantic and LIVES for these angsty romances.

Overall the story wasn't that great. Did I hate it, no. Did I love it, no. Clara became much more annoying in this instalment and the story in general lost it's novelty and attraction that lead me to love Unearthly and rave about it. I don't think this lived up to my expectations (even the second time around) and I'm dreading reading the finale just because I don't want this series to end on a cliché note. I want the two characters that I like to get together. But knowing my luck it won't happen.

BUT even after everything I said, this was still a lovely read and I was very excited to know what happened to everyone after the fire and everyone's relationships. It was interesting to read the turmoil and somewhat internal conflicts between the few, but important,  characters in the story.

MEH

[REVIEW] Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

Published: January 2011
Publisher: HarperTeen
Agee Group: Young Adults
Series: Unearthly #1

In the beginning, there's a boy standing in the trees . . . .

Clara Gardner has recently learned that she's part angel. Having angel blood run through her veins not only makes her smarter, stronger, and faster than humans (a word, she realizes, that no longer applies to her), but it means she has a purpose, something she was put on this earth to do. Figuring out what that is, though, isn't easy.

Her visions of a raging forest fire and an alluring stranger lead her to a new school in a new town. When she meets Christian, who turns out to be the boy of her dreams (literally), everything seems to fall into place—and out of place at the same time. Because there's another guy, Tucker, who appeals to Clara's less angelic side.

As Clara tries to find her way in a world she no longer understands, she encounters unseen dangers and choices she never thought she'd have to make—between honesty and deceit, love and duty, good and evil. When the fire from her vision finally ignites, will Clara be ready to face her destiny?

Unearthly is a moving tale of love and fate, and the struggle between following the rules and following your heart. (From Goodreads)

Unearthly is first a book about angels, yet again. 

In this book though, every angel gets a purpose that they recieve through visions later on in their adolescent life. Clara is a girl with a quarter angel blood and at the beginning of the book, she starts to recieve her purpose. Clara's mother is half angel blood and immediately decides after listening to Clara's brief vision, that they need to move to the location of her purpose, that being Wyoming. When they first get to Wyoming, Clara's glory starts to show in her hair. Glory is essentially when someone of angel blood starts to show their angelic light and it also makes those without angel blood become shocked, unable to speak. Because of this, Clara is forced to die her hair an unpleasent carrot orange. Later on in the story, as the visions become more frequent, Clara recognizes what her purpose is, that she has to save Christian Prescott, the official hottie of school. That starts Clara's attempts at trying to become his girlfriend although he already has one, and completing her purpose. 

The one thing that I absolutly loved about this book was that I didn't know which boy she was going to end up with. There's Christian and someone else, who I won't say because that sort of spoils the story. Usually the guy that the main character loves is pretty obvious but in this story, you think it's one person but no, it's the other then it switches all over again. It definitely will keep you on the edge and the pages turning until you get to the last page.

I also really like surprises in the books I read because usually I figure out what the surprises are going to be as well but i guess I was so caught up in the romance of this story that I didn't even pay attention and expect the surprise. 

The setting isn't explained with much depth and the focus is more on dialogues. 

The one thing I found bad about this book was the some of the characters weren't developed fully until they showed up later. A character would appear with a brief description of who they are and then leave. Later they would reappear and have more description but not fully. I guess what i'm trying to say is that everytime a minor character appears, you learn more about them. I don't like describing characters and it could just be me who feels that way. 

The main plot of this book is also throughout the story but often is forgotten in the main characters social and romance problems. Often it's problem problem, back to the purpose, problem problem, and the purpose, problem again and then new vison. There are alot of sub plots in this story. That being said, this is probably my favourite new series and i absolutely cannot wait for the new sequel! Go read it if you haven't!!!

5/5!
(originally posted in the TPL Word Out program)