I never believed in ghosts. Until one tried to kill me.
When Kennedy Waters finds her mother dead, she doesn't realize that paranormal forces are responsible--not until mysterious identical twins Jared and Lukas Lockhart break into her room and destroy a deadly spirit sent to kill her.
Kennedy learns that her mother's death was no accident, and now she has to take her place in the Legion of the Black Dove--a secret society whose five members were all murdered on the same night, leaving the Legion in the hands of the next generation: a misfit group with unique skills.
As the new members, including the young genius, Priest, and the badass chick, Alara, race to find the Shift and its scattered components, a weapon, the only weapon, capable of destroying the demon. They all use their individual talents to battle paranormal entities and earn their rightful place in the Legion--except for maybe Kennedy.
If she is truly the missing piece of the puzzle, can she stay alive long enough to find out--without losing her heart in the process?
Protect Yourself. What you can't see CAN hurt you.
My Thoughts - A
So this book sat on my desk for two weeks before I decided to pick it up because it was due in a week. I went in expecting it to be a cheesy ghost story for adolescents that gobble that teen fiction up. And to my surprise, I turned into one of them and devoured this book in a few days. It pained me to put it down but my children had to eat; and when I finished it, I felt this empty hollow feeling that can only be filled by the next book (which I have no idea of its release).
DO NOT dive into this series comparing it to Kami Garcia's co-authored Beautiful Creatures series (which is what I was probably doing before I even started it). While the writing style and depth of details is very similar, they have nothing in common as far as the story, characters and setting.
Just like in every other book ever written there is love story intertwined with the plot. This relationship between the main character, Kennedy, and Jared was the only thing that somewhat bothered me throughout the whole story. Their attraction just didn't seem tangible to me. It felt like we, the readers, missed a whole chapter where the two had their initial sparks fly. The attraction just seemed to stem out of nowhere. But if you just ignored that fact, you could eventually feel the tension and desire seeping from the pages.
The supernatural concepts are familiar so it was very easy for me to picture almost every scene where the group had an encounter with ghosts. It actually sounded a lot like one of my favorite shows Supernatural as far as the weapons, myths, and folklore, basically every fundamental idea of ghost hunting and demons. I mean it seems like Garcia watched that show and just plugged in younger characters and a different plot, because the the basis is exactly the same. Now this idea would be great but I saw no indication of credit due to the creator or writers of Supernatural, but I suppose one could argue that she's never seen the show, which would be hard to believe.
Overall I would recommend this book to every supernatural fantasy, folklore, ghost story fan out there. The details and descriptions, the fast-paced plot, and the variety of characters pull you right in the book and you won't want to leave.
Quotes
"In the moonlight, rows of weathered headstones exposed the neat stretch of lawn for what it truly was--the grassy lid of an enormous coffin."
"I wanted to let the pain fill me up and coat my insides with the armor I needed to make it through this."
"It reminded me of a darker day, when I learned that a smile can break just as easily as a heart."
"My world felt that way. Trapped in between the days before it fell apart and the ones I lived in now."
"'So you believe in the devil?' / 'It doesn't matter... He believes in us...'" -Kennedy and Jared