Book Review: The Gathering

Author: Kelley Armstrong

               Website
Pages: 368
Publisher: HarperCollins
Genre: Young Adult / Supernatural
First Published: April 12, 2011
First Line: "Serena stood on the rock ledge twenty feet above the lake, singing in a voice known to bring tears to the eyes of everyone who heard it. Everyone except me."
Buy it from: Amazon
                      Barnes & Noble
Book Trailer:

THE GIST (FROM Goodreads):

Sixteen-year-old Maya is just an ordinary teen in an ordinary town. Sure, she doesn't know much about her background - the only thing she really has to cling to is an odd paw-print birthmark on her hip - but she never really put much thought into who her parents were or how she ended up with her adopted parents in this tiny medical-research community on Vancouver Island.

Until now.

Strange things have been happening in this claustrophobic town - from the mountain lions that have been approaching Maya to her best friend's hidden talent for "feeling" out people and situations, to the sexy new bad boy who makes Maya feel . . . . different. Combine that with a few unexplained deaths and a mystery involving Maya's biological parents and it's easy to suspect that this town might have more than its share of skeletons in its closet.

In The Gathering, New York Times best-selling author Kelley Armstrong brings all the supernatural thrills from her wildly successful Darkest Powers series to Darkness Rising, her scorching hot new trilogy.


OPINION:

The first line of this book is a little deceiving as it really has nothing to do at all with the plot. Also, the cover is nothing like she looks. Love to start out on a negative note...

.............
Anywhoooo, "The Gathering" was entertaining but highly predictable. I KNOW! How is that possible, you ask? Good question. Well, let's start with the predictable; from almost the beginning, we pretty much understand what Maya is. I won't spoil that but alot of it is spelled out so much that you just want to bang Maya in the head when she doesn't get it.

Although Maya finding out about her heritage and what she '"is" was predictable, the Canadian environment, the small research island where they lived, and the inclusion of all the animals were all things I've never read about in a work of fiction and thus kept me interested. I liked all the Native influence in the story too, though, sometimes when these things are added they tend to overpower. It didn't happen here luckily.

As for characters (arguably the most important part), the protagonist, Maya, was dynamic. She was a little too perfect--as in everyone loved her, cared about her opinion, wanted to protect her blah blah blah but that didn't bother me since she lived in such a small town that the people couldn't really be too choosy. She was clearly a good person but with a lot of imperfections that kept her from being stagnant. The secondary characters, such as Rafe and Daniel, had distinguishable personalities and were interesting on their own. The romance was a little rushed but I like where it's heading.

All the elements of the book weren't explained or tied together by the end but I didn't feel cheated out of a ending. Ever feel like the end of the book was that moment right before you reach the top of the mountain and are about to see the other side but--instead there's suddenly a cliff and that's it? This was not like that. A lot of the action did culminate at the end, I just felt like Maya is still going to take a while to figure it out so the ending was that we were getting close to the answers but still had a long way to go to get them. Just like Maya. Although there were a lot of loose ends, I'm not going to be pre-ordering the book cause I. HAVE. TO. KNOW. More like I'm interested. Will definitely order at some point. I'm just not peeing my pants waiting which is nice since its no longer acceptable, at my age, to do that.

OVERALL:

I could put the book down at 10 pm and pick it up another day so it wasn't completely engrossing but it was definitely a good, entertaining read--- 7.5