Changes

Many books I read at the moment seem to start slowly and pick up speed. This one starts quickly and is going at a canter by about a third of the way through. Even the bits at the start which appear to be 'just' character development turn out to be subtle foreshadowing as certain facts are revealed to the two teens. It's a multi-layered, wonderfully deep plot, with rich characters and an incredible atmosphere which gave me goose bumps while reading it. It has obvious similarities to [[Teenage boy meets mysterious new stranger in a small town. They fall in love, he finds out she's harbouring a dark secret, the pair of them try to find out if their relationship can work while she tries to keep him safe from her world. This kind of book appears to be released every few weeks since [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]] became so successful – but rarely in the past few years has it been done as well as it has in Beautiful Creatures.|Twilight]], but it also draws on ''To Kill A Mockingbird'' – not only is it the book their English class is reading, but Macon's dog is called Boo Radley.