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A review by darastar
Abandon by Meg Cabot
2.0
So, this book is fairly infuriating.
The main character, Pierce, is simultaneously very smart and independent, and then completely idiotic and clingy. She doesn't seem to have much of a personality, and when she dies (this part is not a spoiler, because it happens at the beginning of the book) - it's for a dumb reason, and the explanation of it is even dumber. Seriously: she's running around her family's pool in the winter chasing an injured bird, trips on the scarf she is wearing (which - is long enough to trip over?), and falls on the pool cover and drowns. I don't even understand.
And then later, when we discover that the entire ridiculous situation described above was contrived by her Fury grandmother to kill her - uh, what? Seriously? You knit your granddaughter a too long scarf and tempted her with an injured bird in hopes that she would trip on it, hit her head, fall into the pool and die? I CAN'T EVEN HANDLE HOW STUPID THAT IS.
But back to Pierce. Her relationship with John is also one of the dumber things I've ever read. From what we're told, her entire contact with him is thus: 1) She meets him as a 7 year old for like 5 minutes, and he's nice to her because she wants a bird to come back to life (also her recently deceased grandfather). 2) She recognizes him in the underworld, and is more concerned for him and his horse than she is for herself (and also is not scared?). And thus he falls in love with her and decides to keep her with him (Guys - it's Hades and Persephone). And since she's like, 15 and doesn't want to stay in the underworld forever, she runs away and comes back to life (WHAT?). And because she's wearing a necklace he gave her, when she's assaulted twice, John swoops in twice - never really saying anything to her, or she to him - and saves her. So that's 4 encounters so far, only one of which lasted more than say...5 minutes.
Pierce goes to the cemetery where she first met him to give back the necklace (which is an enormous diamond? how are people not going HOLY CRAP WHERE DID THAT ENORMOUS DIAMOND YOU ALWAYS WEAR COME FROM?), and they fight for like 20 minutes and break up except not really, and then we go through 2/3 of the book, and he finally shows up again, and she reiterates that she's not interested in him, until he pulls her down on top of him and they start making out.
And that's it. The greatest love story of our time. Making out with a stranger who kidnapped you, who is a death deity, who you HARDLY KNOW.
And then who kidnaps you again later "for your own good", and the book ends. Because how else will you stretch out a super thin plot into a trilogy in order to sell more books?
The number of questions that were answered at the end of this book? Maybe 1 or 2. The number of plot points that were left hanging in the air, unresolved because that would make too much logical sense? About 100.
I get it - supernatural romance YA is super popular (or was when this was written). And glomming onto the plot of greek myths is a great idea. But this was just poorly executed, with a main character who I kept vacillating on liking or wanting to smack upside the head, and ended up just wanting to punch in the face for being so wishy-washy.
2 stars for some inventive ideas...but failing completely in the execution and in getting me to emotionally connect to or care about any of the characters.
(except Kayla - she is the only reason I would continue reading. I kind of want to know what her story is.)
Spoiler
The main character, Pierce, is simultaneously very smart and independent, and then completely idiotic and clingy. She doesn't seem to have much of a personality, and when she dies (this part is not a spoiler, because it happens at the beginning of the book) - it's for a dumb reason, and the explanation of it is even dumber. Seriously: she's running around her family's pool in the winter chasing an injured bird, trips on the scarf she is wearing (which - is long enough to trip over?), and falls on the pool cover and drowns. I don't even understand.
And then later, when we discover that the entire ridiculous situation described above was contrived by her Fury grandmother to kill her - uh, what? Seriously? You knit your granddaughter a too long scarf and tempted her with an injured bird in hopes that she would trip on it, hit her head, fall into the pool and die? I CAN'T EVEN HANDLE HOW STUPID THAT IS.
But back to Pierce. Her relationship with John is also one of the dumber things I've ever read. From what we're told, her entire contact with him is thus: 1) She meets him as a 7 year old for like 5 minutes, and he's nice to her because she wants a bird to come back to life (also her recently deceased grandfather). 2) She recognizes him in the underworld, and is more concerned for him and his horse than she is for herself (and also is not scared?). And thus he falls in love with her and decides to keep her with him (Guys - it's Hades and Persephone). And since she's like, 15 and doesn't want to stay in the underworld forever, she runs away and comes back to life (WHAT?). And because she's wearing a necklace he gave her, when she's assaulted twice, John swoops in twice - never really saying anything to her, or she to him - and saves her. So that's 4 encounters so far, only one of which lasted more than say...5 minutes.
Pierce goes to the cemetery where she first met him to give back the necklace (which is an enormous diamond? how are people not going HOLY CRAP WHERE DID THAT ENORMOUS DIAMOND YOU ALWAYS WEAR COME FROM?), and they fight for like 20 minutes and break up except not really, and then we go through 2/3 of the book, and he finally shows up again, and she reiterates that she's not interested in him, until he pulls her down on top of him and they start making out.
And that's it. The greatest love story of our time. Making out with a stranger who kidnapped you, who is a death deity, who you HARDLY KNOW.
And then who kidnaps you again later "for your own good", and the book ends. Because how else will you stretch out a super thin plot into a trilogy in order to sell more books?
The number of questions that were answered at the end of this book? Maybe 1 or 2. The number of plot points that were left hanging in the air, unresolved because that would make too much logical sense? About 100.
I get it - supernatural romance YA is super popular (or was when this was written). And glomming onto the plot of greek myths is a great idea. But this was just poorly executed, with a main character who I kept vacillating on liking or wanting to smack upside the head, and ended up just wanting to punch in the face for being so wishy-washy.
2 stars for some inventive ideas...but failing completely in the execution and in getting me to emotionally connect to or care about any of the characters.
(except Kayla - she is the only reason I would continue reading. I kind of want to know what her story is.)