Storm

This is a book that I feel should be better than it is. It has all the elements (no pun intended) to be a book that I would enjoy. It features a group of people who have super powers (in this case, people who can control the elements) and it has characters who, at first seem to be interesting. However, this book too often devolves into the love triangle of “do I love this boy or that boy?” and it doesn't stretch beyond that trope to be anything memorable.

The point of view throughout most of the story is the girl Becca. As I type this, I am trying to find something interesting to say about her: what her interests, or hobbies are, but I just can't think of any. All that we do know about her is that she has an undeserved reputation at school, and that she had something bad happen to her in the past. She isn't as bad as Bella from the Twilight series, but she doesn't have enough personality to carry us through the story. This is okay though because we have....

Chris, who is the other major viewpoint of the story and, along with his brothers, is far more interesting than Becca. One of the aspects that I really enjoyed about this book was the way the brothers razzed each other. It felt like they were real people, so when the idea of their powers came into play, it felt like they were real people who were trying to deal with supernatural problems. The author tries to give each of them unique personalities, but sadly, that doesn't happen. If it weren't for which power they had, I'd forget who was who at times.

And since we are talking about their powers, lets talk about their powers. The mythologizes that surrounds who they are is a bit of a letdown. It feels like it is barely explained, barely explored, and often leaves more questions than answers. One question I have is, why is a gun the only sure fire way of killing these guys? The brothers say that they can heal using the elements around them, so why can't they heal from a gunshot wound using water or whatever? Also the idea of what Becca is in relation to their powers is kind of lame. And, one could say, a little sexist. All of the boys get these cool powers, but what can she do? She just gives them a power boost similar to being an energy bar or the Energizer bunny...greeeeeaaaaaattt. I hope her powers mature in the next book, assuming I want to read it. Also, the way the author wrote into the story how there are very few people who can control all four elements makes it painfully obvious that she will be one of those people.

And with regard to what happened to Becca that caused her to have a reputation at school, I'll say this...it isn't explored enough for me to care one way or another. One review I read said that it would have been cool if the author write about the double standards between men and women in with the backdrop of superpowers, and I agree, I'd have liked to see that. Sadly, it feels like the author choose not to go there because she wanted to do a love triangle. So stupid.

In the end this novel feels like it is trying too hard to tell too many things, and instead of making a great-novel-soup, we get mediocre-slop. I MIGHT pick up the next in the series, if I can find it for free, and I'd suggest you do the same for this book. I got it on iBooks, so you might be able to pick it up there. I give it a 2 out of 5.

4.8/5
review soon

Well this was a surprise. I've had this book on my TBR for years but I kept avoiding it because of the terrible original cover and the summary on Goodreads. It really sounds awful. Worse than most blurbs for YA books. But I couldn't decide what to read because I wasn't in the mood for anything so I picked a random number from my TBR and this was what I got.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. It was a lot of fun. I liked the writing, the characters (for the most part) and their sarcasm and banter, I also enjoyed the action, the pacing was great. I just flew through it. Unfortunately the good was overshadowed at times by some things I didn't like at all. You can guess it, double standard regarding sex, love triangle (team Hunter all the way), lack of shock and doubt when a regular human being is faced with supernatural beings and events and some really stupid decisions on behalf of the heroine. YA is basically plagued by these so I can't say I was taken by surprise. Otherwise, very entertaining book.