Trying something new. Instead of genuine titles, I shall replace them with amusing childhood stories.
NOW TO BUSINESS AND SUCH
So I read a book today. Actually I finished one that I've been reading for a long time, even though it's only like 300-something pages. It is called "The Gifted" by Anna Kathryn Davis and it is terrifically bad. Let me tell you why.
Just to warn you, there will be SPOILERS, because I'm pretty sure the only people who read this blog are my mom and the gnat that lives in my room whom I have named Tony. He reads over my shoulder.
The basic plot and most of the story world is fairly well-crafted. Basically, humanity is being taken over by these bug things from another dimension. There's a fancy Greek word for them that I can't remember, so let's call them Un-Dragons.
Then there's this... girl.
Okay so have you ever read a book and just thrown it down in anger because the characters had no flaws and were absolutely perfect in every conceivable way? *coughTWILIGHTcough*
Well... this girl is about eleventy-twelve times worse.
Her name is Rose and she has a superpower. Her superpower is PRETTY. She's the prettiest damn prettyfier that ever prettied a pretty. She can't walk around in public because her PRETTY FUCKING FACE causes riots everywhere she goes, so instead, she lives all by herself in the woods.
Oh right and she has this giant-ass tiger as a PET because she was bored in a zoo and decided she wanted a tiger, and keeping wild animals as pets is a GREAT message to be sending.
So anyway this boy shows up and man is he WEIRD, first of all he doesn't go apeshit over how stinkin' pretty she is so he must be like a total tool. Long story short he tells Pretty McSexyface Rose that she's magical and OMG so is he, and they're mean to stop the infestation by the Un-Dragons.
Rose, being the tough little scrapper that she is and ALSO without putting a single silky flawless hair out of place, fights this new guy. (His name is Parker but I call him Captain Thunder.) SHOCKINGLY, Rose wins, even though she has absolutely no training whatsoever and she just kind of "taught herself." Who the fuck wins their first fight like that? Has she been fighting her pet tiger? Whatever.
So long story short Rose meets these three other magic kids (they're called The Gifted in case you wanted to know why the title was the title), this one girl is super mean to her but Rose just laughs at her because she's just such a NICE PERSON and FORGIVING and PRETTY and not a total asshat at all.
Longer story short... the super mean girl is really nice on the inside, but someone just had to break through her tough shell to get the squishy sweetness inside.
Man I miss Twinkies.
Anyway, the Un-Dragons are almost done taking over the world, and they cotton on to these magic kids and one of the bugs (inside a human host, cause they can do that through a process that is actually quite cool) ends up killing the pet tiger. Noooooooooooo.
Then there's this secret cult of people living underground in the desert who knew about these Gifted kids through... like a prophecy? Or the zodiac, I think, cause everyone keeps calling Rose a "Cancer" and I doubt it's because of her slow, methodical process of ruining my respect for this book. This cult basically knows everything there is to know about the Un-Dragons and even has this one guy who has an Un-Dragon INSIDE HIS MIND but it doesn't take control of him because, um, he concentrates really well.
I should probably mention that Rose and Captain Thunder are slowly (not slowly at all, it kind of happened in the space of four pages) falling in love because their zodiac signs correspond super well or something. Sorry. There's a reason why I don't read romance novels.
So through this cult, Rosey and Friends discover that the reason they all have superpowers is because they all have Un-Dragon BLOOD in them, HOLY CRAP THEY'RE BARELY EVEN HUMAN AUGH etc. etc., and BIG SHOCK Rose is the one with the most Un-Dragon DNA and THAT'S why she's so much more powerful than like EVERYONE in the universe. Also she is special and pretty and tough and has next to no personality whatsoever.
So the cult is like "hey y'all we're gonna stage an attack at this major Un-Dragon headquarters which also happens to be a swanky hotel and coincidentally they're having a ball on the night of the attack and we need someone on the inside" and HOLY CRAP AGAIN they pick Rose, who has to suffer through sitting in a VIP suite for days and yet somehow manages to hold herself together enough to get in a DRESS for this ball tomorrow. Damn that girl is a trooper. She inspires us all.
Anyway, the night of the ball comes around and the cult people attack the Un-Dragons, and it all ends quite abruptly and I think Rose died but I'm not really sure. At first I thought, well, maybe my copy was a misprint and they forgot to put in an extra two chapters or something, but then I saw the acknowledgments and it was all like "what" and then I might have thrown the book on the floor or something.
Now let me say first that I didn't NOT enjoy this book. I just sorely wished I could read it from the perspective of anyone but Rose. The premise was good and there were all these little details about the Un-Dragons like how they can rip their way out of human hosts and emerge as GIANT ARSE BUGS and such, and how two Un-Dragons in human bodies could conceivably... um... "knock boots" and make a weird mutant baby that is fully Un-Dragon and fully human. (There was a super long Greek name for that too, but I'm out of creative substitutes so it's just gonna be "weird mutant baby.")
All said and done, Miss Davis, replace your main character with someone a LITTLE BIT less intolerable and get back to us. Use Bella Swan. Nurse Ratchet. Charlize Theron. ANYBODY.
And yes, I did use to tell everyone I was marrying a horse. I WAS SIX YEARS OLD OKAY.