The title pretty much sums up my feelings towards this book, however, I will stick a review after it so that I can justify my loathing. When it comes to Wicked Lovely, I am a hater, but not a mindless one. I gave this book a chance, read the entire thing… I simply regret doing so.
You know
when something has potential, but somehow utterly fails to deliver? Kind of
like the Eragon movie. Well, that is
how I feel about Wicked Lovely. It’s
a book set in a very similar world to that of Cassandra Clare’s City of Bones, which was quite a good
read, so I optimistically thought that perhaps Melissa Marr’s creation could be
alright. Urban fantasy is definitely not my preferred genre; however, while I
didn’t particularly want to read City of
Bones, I’m glad I did. Maybe Wicked
Lovely would be good after all.
LOL JKS.
While Wicked Lovely shares some traits with City of Bones, the story was not nearly
as well-executed or ambitious. Cassandra Clare had some clichés, but she
developed them and added some originality for good measure. Melissa Marr’s
book, meanwhile, contains only those elements of City of Bones which are weakest. So you get your female protagonist
who can see people no-one else can see; who is prettier than she believes
herself to be; and who is said to be
full of snarky attitude, but not shown
to be so. There are also love triangles involving two beautiful teenage boys
who are highly possessive protective of the girl-who-of-course-I-don’t-need-saving-wait-no-he’s-hot.
Cassandra Clare, however, takes the supernatural beings, magic, and parallel
world to a new level. Melissa Marr doesn’t – and what a pity that is.
Here’s a
brief summary of the book to put us on the same page. Basically, the story
revolves around Aislinn (apparently pronounced ‘Ashling’, FYI), a teenage girl
who possesses the Sight. The latter enables her to see the invisible faeries that
are, in fact, all around us. She must, however, keep her gift secret for the
fear that the faeries will harm her if they discover that she can see them.
Then, a faerie named Keenan starts stalking following her around,
convinced that she is the ‘Summer Queen’ who will spend all eternity with him,
the Summer King, in order to ward off the gradual onset of winter’s dominance
with their love. Aislinn, however, has no intention of becoming the Summer
Queen – particularly not with the temptation of her oh-so-attractive anchor in
the human world, Seth.
Just a
warning before we proceed with the dissection; if you’re still thinking about
reading this book, there are spoilers coming up in the next few paragraphs
(nothing drastic though – it’s not like there were any real secrets to spoil).
Overall,
the characters were stereotypical, run-of-the-mill. I had the impression that I
had met all of them before, and probably in far more sophisticated forms too. A
lot of them also seemed unable to remain in character, and appeared to enjoy
acting without any real motivation, or explanation as to why.
You’d
expect the main character to draw the reader in some way, but Aislinn was
bland. She was pretty (but didn’t realise how beautiful she actually was – gasp!) and had a rare gift, which
‘runs-in-the-genes’. So, we’ve been told that she’s special because of her Sight,
but personality-wise, there’s nothing about her that makes you want to hang out
with her for the next 300 pages. You’re never entirely sure whether or not she
wants to be protected, or be the sassy, kick-ass type of leading lady; it
changes a lot. One minute she’s freaking out about being stalked by faeries,
which I can understand, but what I can’t forgive is that she swings back and
forth between that and vowing to tell the faeries to go stuff themselves. So,
on the whole, not very impressive. Apart from the pendulum effect (which
doesn’t count) there isn’t any real change or development in her character
either.
Onto the
next unmemorable character: Seth, the human guy in the love triangle. He is
gorgeous (in Aislinn’s eyes at least – but we’ll get to that later), and is
also basically infatuated with Aislinn, taking on the role of protective male.
Ultimately, he is blandly portrayed as the perfect man. Always there for
Aislinn, always looking out for her; he’d do anything for her, quite
unconditionally. He even believes her when she breaks down and tells him about
faeries! That’s sweet, but too good to be true.
Frankly, this
book would have benefited from having more conflict. The story would’ve been
infinitely more interesting if Seth had a few flaws and called bull when
Aislinn started talking about faeries. After all, he’s portrayed as being this
guy who is tough, respected by all his oh-so-hardcore friends, always throwing
parties, totally desirable, has slept with 40 women (no, I’m not making this up
– he’s around twenty years old, btw)… And while we are told he cares about
Aislinn, would a guy like him really risk his image by believing her? I doubt
it. Unless, of course, the world revolves around her, in which case I spy A
MARY SUE!
Another
issue I have with this book (and specifically, with Seth) – he lives in an
‘abandoned train’, which he apparently bought himself. He also owns a pet
snake? How? No explanation. Why? Well, there’s no real purpose for the train or
the snake in the story, which leads me to believe that this is yet another
misguided attempt to make Seth appear really cool. And – literally – totally
unbelievable.
See, I told
you this book was dodgy.
Just before
we move on (read: stab and flee) from the character of Seth, I should point out
a few elements of his perfection which grated. Firstly, the supposed proof of
his attractiveness and his loyalty to Aislinn comes through his romantic
revelation that he not only got himself checked for STDs and has none, but that
he has also restrained himself from sleeping around for seven months. True love
right there.
Additionally, he is lovingly portrayed as flawless, yet also sports emo
hair, tattoos, and body piercings. He enjoys hanging out in alleyways, tattoo
parlours and nightclubs. In fact, all of the characters seem to find this kind
of behaviour very ‘hip’ and can’t wait until they too can flee the tyranny of
education and employment to join this seedy underbelly of town.
Yes, this
is a judgemental view based on stereotypes. No, I don’t hate everyone with
tattoos and body piercings – in fact; I have friends and family members with
both. I do think, however, that this book’s setting is, in a word, ‘seedy’. As a
reader or in real life, I don’t want to hang around in some of the places these
characters love. I also doubt many people can really relate to the characters,
who are either a) completely slutty Catholic schoolgirls (a stereotype which
has been blown waaay out of proportion by this book, and which isn’t really a
stereotype needing encouragement); b) stalkers – but in the end, hey, it’s okay
because they’re hot; and c) people who think heaven is a dark alleyway dotted
with tattoo parlours.
While you
could potentially venture into a dark alley, befriend the
perfectly-nice-though-covered-in-tattoos boy inside it, and make it out the
other end, this is probably the exception, not the rule – and one certainly
shouldn’t bank on the boy being friendly and without self-interest. The
characters and setting in Wicked Lovely
are glorified. Nice attempt to break down stereotypes (almost reminds me of
this excellent song, but not quite, considering Wicked Lovely is far less well realised), but at the same time, as
the readership of this book is tween/teen girls, the message coming from it is
very bad indeed. Essentially; slutty is cool, slutty gets you guys, you need
men in your life, and a man who has slept with forty women is an eligible and
highly desirable partner for a 17-year-old-girl. Oh, and rebel – you may be
underage, but don’t let that stop you from drinking, dancing in nightclubs,
sleeping with men, and hanging out in dingy bars and tattoo parlours. I’m not a
prude, but I can’t see that message being a good one for 13-year-olds.
Sigh. This
is becoming a rant, and I think my distaste for the book is bringing out the
worst in me. Let’s administer the killing blow and be done with it all.
Keenan. He’s the Summer King of the faeries,
and he’s been trying to find a Queen for 900 years. His tactic for making them
fall in love with him is the good old stalk-them-until-they-give-in. Great. Every
so long a potential queen shows up – including AISLINN’S MOTHER (clear case of
the disturbing Jacob-Bella-Renesmee romance in Breaking Dawn) but none as yet have ended up being The One. The
potential queens either become Winter Girls or Summer Girls, depending on
whether they opt to try to be Keenan’s sole love, the Summer Queen, a position
determined by the magical reckoning of a staff, or play safe and simply become
a Summer Girl (*coughCONCUBINEcough*). If a potential candidate tries for
Summer Queen and fails, she becomes a Winter Girl, which means she mopes for
all eternity as she is forever separated from Keenan due to him being part of
the Summer Court, and her part of the Winter Court.
To be quite
honest, I never understood everything about the various courts, or the Winter
Girls (can there be more than one at a time…?). The world of the fey is minimally
explored and developed. We don’t even know why/how faeries exist!
To be fair,
maybe these questions will be answered in future books. I sure hope that’s the
case, because the loose folklore base of the fey could make the story far more
interesting. After reading Wicked Lovely,
however, do I have any desire to read the sequel? Not really! Therefore, for
me, this book fails as the first book of a series for it gives me no desire to
read on.
Oh, and the
villain was quite possibly the most badly-written antagonist I have ever come
across. She was unbelievably flat.
There are inanimate objects with more
character than her.
I try to be
a nice, generous person, but Wicked
Lovely makes that challenging.
On a
positive note, however, there is one character in this book that breaks the
mould. Donia is a Winter Girl who remains in love with Keenan. She is messed
up, confused, a little bit tragic, and actually piques the reader’s interest.
Give the girl a prize.
Now back to
the negative… The quality of writing was not great. Certain passages jarred a
little, and the characters didn’t seem to have particularly different voices.
A final point:
this book really isn’t appropriate for kids under 13 or so. There’s heaps of
sexual tension, many mentions of sex and rape; a rather disturbing scene where
a faerie is almost raped while the protagonists watch on, taking their time to
finish their conversation before intervening; other sexual assault; and a host
of characters entirely driven by sexual desires. I’m stating this no more
bluntly than the way it is presented in the book.
I feel like
this review is making me sound like a prude, however, I simply found this book
to be very tasteless and unpleasant. I don’t mind sex and violence in books if
it is well-executed, but unfortunately Wicked
Lovely fails on the execution front too. Sad face.
The bottom
line: This book’s only saving grace is Donia, and the potential for originality
in the world of the fey. Basically, Wicked
Lovely is one of the many Paranormal Romance / YA novels which have spawned
from Twilight’s success. If the use of the word ‘spawned’ there offends you, or
you don’t understand what it means[1],
then you’ll probably enjoy this book.
If you are, however, one of those people who
sidesteps the entire PR shelf when perusing the local bookstore…run fast, run
far.
Pippa’s rating: 2/10
Additional Note: I tried to read the sequel in the
hope that the series would get better. I dragged myself through one hundred
agonising pages. Any improvement? NOT. AT. ALL. My brain cells will wear the
scars of this torture forever.
[1]
[in the above context] – spawn: the product or offspring of a person, place, or
(in this case) object. The term is used to express distaste or disgust.
And yes, that was low. If you didn’t know what ‘spawned’ meant, however, at least now you do. Plus, I may have recommended a book to you which you will really enjoy.
And yes, that was low. If you didn’t know what ‘spawned’ meant, however, at least now you do. Plus, I may have recommended a book to you which you will really enjoy.
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