Beautiful Darkness Review

"Ethan Wate used to think of Gatlin, the small Southern town he had always called home, as a place where nothing ever changed. Then he met mysterious newcomer Lena Duchannes, who revealed a secret world that had been hidden in plain sight all along. A Gatlin that harbored ancient secrets beneath its moss-covered oaks and cracked sidewalks. A Gatlin where a curse has marked Lena's family of powerful Supernaturals for generations. A Gatlin where impossible, magical, life-altering events happen.Sometimes life-ending

Together they can face anything Gatlin throws at them, but after suffering a tragic loss, Lena starts to pull away, keeping secrets that test their relationship. And now that Ethan's eyes have been opened to the darker side of Gatlin, there's no going back. Haunted by strange visions only he can see, Ethan is pulled deeper into his town's tangled history and finds himself caught up in the dangerous network of underground passageways endlessly crisscrossing the South, where nothing is as it seems"

from goodreads.com

Date Published: October 12, 2010

Publisher: Little Brown & Co

Pages: 512

This is the second installment of Ethan Wate and Lena Duchannes.  The book starts off where the first one left off, Lena is still unclaimed; but she knows she has to claim herself. However, there is this new guy in town that is hanging, John Breed, around and Ridley is back in town; and that always means TROUBLE.  Ethan soon learns what being with and "unclaimed" confused Caster means.  Lena has a major decision to make and it will affect everyone.

Obviously the second book in MOST series is not as good as the first.  This one follows that suit.  It's not that I didn't care for this one, it's just that I didn't feel like a lot was explained.  It seemed like there was some information that we could have been given that we weren't.  There were "action" scenes that did not have the right amount of action.  Especially one particular scene near the end (Gosh, I wanna rant about it SO bad; but I don't wanna spoil it for anybody!)

In Beautiful Darkness, Ethan seems to be the same boy that he was in the first one.  He grows and develops his own traits and characteristics in this book.  He also receives his own destiny! Lena got on my nerves in this book, she was also kind of annoying the last book to; but she was VERY annoying in this one.  I like that there was more of Link and Ridley; I didn't like how they handled things at the end! 

I thought the plot in this book flowed better than Beautiful Creatures. I did like that there was actually traveling. The "action" scene at the end was kind of annoying.  It was the one thing you were waiting for the WHOLE book and it was a let down.

The third book in the Caster Chronicle series will be released sometime next year and is currently Untitled.

***/5

Beautiful Creatures Review

"Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she's struggling to conceal her power, and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.
In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything."

from goodreads.com

I gave this book 4/5 because there were some slow parts, that I felt could have been shortened. Other than that I really enjoyed the book
.
Ethan sees this girl that everyone is calling "Ravenwoods niece" at school and fell head over heels as soon as he saw her. He soon learns that there is a lot more underneath her black clothes and green eyes.

The plot of the book was very interesting, however; after you learn about the locket they find and who it belongs to, I saw the story going a different way. I kinda wished the writer would have included more of the past in with the ending. There were some parts that included Ethan's aunts that I felt could have been shortened. Although there were other parts I would have liked to read more about.

The characters were developed and not to whiny. I did find Lena a bit whiny, but she kinda had a reason to be. I think they should have went more into the other characters, like Genvieve or the other Ethan.
So it was a pretty good book, although there were some parts that could have been better.

****