Low Red Moon
Author: Ivy Devlin
Series: ? (#1)
Publisher: Bloomsbury
How Received: publisher ARC
Any quotes seen may be different in the final, published version.
Avery Hood is reeling from the loss of her parents--and the fact that she can't remember what happened to them even though she was there.
She's struggling to adjust to life without them, and to living with her grandmother, when she meets Ben, who isn't like any guy she's ever met before.
It turns out there's a reason why, and Ben's secret may hold the key to Avery finding out what happened to her parents...
But what if that secret changes everything she knows about--and feels for--Ben?
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I was really excited to read this - not just because the summary sounds pretty kick ass, but because Ivy Devlin is rumored to be a pseudonym for somebody else. I had the name up, but they politely asked me to take it down, so I shall. (I don't understand, though - why use a pseudonym if everybody is going to know it's you? Alas.)
Devlin has a beautiful writing style. It drags you in, and her ability to paint the setting for you in so few words is fantastic. And her characters - at least, the main characters - are very well created. I loved Ben's struggle, and Avery's ties to the forest were fantastic.
But she made the same problem so many debut paranormal authors are making.
She is trying to rewrite Twilight.
No, the plot (which I shall get into in a moment) is nothing like Twilight. But the romance was the same. Down to THIS. Though, since I have an ARC, maybe they cut it out in the final version.
"How old are you?"
"Seventeen," he said.
"Seventeen for how long?" My voice shook.
"Six months. Why?"
REALLY!? I mean, come on. You couldn't do better than that? REALLY!?
And then we come to my biggest problem with this book - the plot. Did I finish until the end? Yes. But it was only to make sure that I was right. I found it sadly predictable - I had the entire thing figured out by page 85. The book is about 200 pages long. It took me less than half of the book to figure it out.
However, though predictable, it was an interesting plot, and Devlin's writing and characters pull the book out of the dumpster pile it could have been thrown in.
Overall Rating & Final Comments: 6/10. Interesting characters, great writing, lacking plot - but sure to please fans of Twilight and paranormal romance.
Low Red Moon or Nightshade? Nightshade was the last paranormal story I finished, and sadly, my vote goes to that - the plot in that one is faaaaantastic.
Cover Comments: It's not something I would pick up in the store, but I'm digging it.
Low Red Moon comes out today! Today! TODAY! So you can run and pick it up in your local bookstore, or order it online - or come back in about an hour or so and try to win it here on WORD.