The Raven Boys

This one is hard for me to rate. For the first 200 pages or so, it was just a really weird story, with characters that seemed unrealistic and a world that was ours but with enough supernatural elements to make it impossible. A bunch of high school children believing in a buried Welsh king in Virginia and the magical ley lines of energy that would lead to him seemed too far-fetched and it was difficult for me to get into it, though I kept reading because I was determined to finish when so many of my friends had enjoyed the book. After page 200 though, the action finally started picking up and with the revelation of Noah's backstory, I was finally invested and enjoyed finishing the final 100 or so pages. It was a solid 3 stars up until that and then I wavered between 3 and 4. The writing is good enough to keep the reader engaged but, like I said, some of the characterisations of these supposed children are too unrealistic - especially Gansey. I just can't imagine a 17 year old, ridiculously rich or not, being obsessed with medieval legends and asserting himself as a father figure to his friends. I'm looking forward to reading the sequel because it focuses more on Ronan and his family.