Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Hex Hall, Rachel Hawkins

So Sophie Mercer is a witch. Not in a "sacrifice goats and call up demons" way, but in a "my dad was a warlock who got my mom pregnant and then kinda neglected to tell her about that or the magic that ran in the family until AFTER I was born with the ability to make some really socially inappropriate people fall in love with each other," way. And Sophie isn't supposed to use her magic when normal people might see it, but she slipped one night at a dance, and things went DRAMATIC.

Wham, welcome to Hecate Hall, where Prodigium (faries, witches, and shifters) are sentenced invited to go when they can't "control themselves." She's gone from almost normal life, to reform school with people who can kill you with their minds. ^_^ To make things even BETTER, she finds out after she's there that her DAD, (remember the warlock who neglected to mention his war-lock-ness to her mom?) is now head honcho of the committee that's in charge of keeping Prodigium secret- which translated means that everyone she's going to school with has a grudge against her dad, and therefore her.

Oh, and the cute guy she's crushing majorly on is dating the mean girl who is alternately trying to recruit her into her lovely little "oh, let's raise some zombies on the weekend, it'll be fun and sparkly!" group and trying to sabotage what's left of Sophie's life. And Sophie's been in the "normal" world for most of her life, so she's behind the curve on most every subject that the twelve year olds think a teddy bear could master.

What does Sophie do? What any self-respecting teenager would do. Say "I hate my life," be sarcastic to teachers, make friends with the only other person who has a similar social standing (the pink-loving vampire who OMG, might have EATEN someone!) and sigh from a distance at the cute boy.

AND THEN EVERYTHING GOES DARK.

DUM DUM DUM.

The summary I just wrote might not be entirely accurate to all the details. JSYK. I didn't want to spoil things for you. I want you to read the book, and when it hits the end, to have my exact reaction- OMWORD THAT IS FREAKY OH NO BODY COUNT WAH I TRUSTED YOU WHO CAN I TRUST EVERYTHING I KNOW IS A LIE. (That reaction might be a trifle louder than I am normally, but I just ate half a batch of chocolate chip cookies. Volume happens.)

Let's go over the points that I feel need to be communicated.

  1. You should read this book, so that Rachel writes many more books that we the general population gets to read. The fact that it is lovely and has a wonderful plot and I read it in one sitting is taken for granted, as related to the caps lock in the previous paragraphs.
  2. I love Sophie's sarcasm.
  3. I love Archer. I know things look bad, but that's only because the circumstances LIE LIKE A RUG. We don't have all the information! EVERYONE KNOWS THAT WHEN YOU HAVE ALL THE INFORMATION THINGS WILL LOOK BETTER.
  4. Jenna's story is wonderful. I need to make a note and put it on my wall so that I treat all "side characters" in a similarly made-of-stark-awesome way.
  5. I want Demonglass now. Plz?

I gave it four stars out of five. Go read it. I need to go find tea and learn how to communicate without shouting.

4 comments:

Bahnree said...

Hm I forgot how glowing your review of this was. I almost read it at Kendra's but for some reason thought you didn't like this one as much. XD LOLZ Anyway I'll try to pick it up.

Snazel said...

Heheheh. Yeah, I really liked it. It isn't one that kinda plugs directly into my nervous system, as White Cat and Rise Of Renegade X, but it's certainly in the VERY FUN YA WHICH YOU SHOULD READ pile. As evidenced by the fact that I loaned her to Kendra. :P

The big thing for me is that this is Ms. Hawkins's first book, and I REALLY want her to keep writing. :D As one would hope.

Bahnree said...

LOL i love re-reading your reviews once I've actually read the book....:D This is a good one. I agree that Archer probably isn't as evil as the end makes him out to be. I wasn't as surprised by the ending because I was like "TRUST NO ONE" the whole time, anddddd yeah. I'm not a trusting person. XD

Snazel said...

I'm kinda not sure if I'm a trusting person or not. :P The end certainly whiplashed me, cause I thought I was suspicious, and then everything went BADDDDDDDDD. Ahem.

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