Beautiful Creatures

author: Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

published: December 1st 2009

publisher: Little, Brown and Company

format: Hardcover

pages: 563

genre: fantasy

The following synopsis comes from the official Beautiful Creatures website

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she’s struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps, and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town’s oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.

My Thoughts:

The Cover:

This is a beautiful cover. It is the first thing I noticed about the book and it grabbed my attention immediately. The text for the title is unlike any I've seen before. I love that the title is in a unique font as well as purple and shiny. The title is the focal point on the cover which is not usually the case. At least I don't think it is. The picture is trees. They are shiny silver, but not at all overpowering. The entire outside of the book is shiny. And I really like that. I think it's a good attention getter. I saw this cover and needed to know what the book was about, and with a name like Beautiful Creatures I was hooked.

The Book:

I was a little worried because the book is 563 pages. The last book I read that was that long was a Harry Potter book (and now Anna Karenina) and it was not the first in a series. I wasn't sure if it would drag on or if it would all be worth it. It was all worth it.

This is a unique world with great characters that I wanted to see succeed. Lena is an outsider and Ethan is not, but he doesn't really feel like he completely belongs. Ethan befriends her and together they go on an adventure where they learn about themselves and their past. It's an exciting story that takes the reader into a different world.

I was surprised that the book is told from Ethan's point of view. I was expecting it to be "the girl" mentioned on the inside flap, because many, if not all, of the fantasy/sci-fi romantic books I've read have been told from a female perspective. I found this to be refreshing. I really enjoyed reading from his side of everything.

I highly recommend Beautiful Creatures.

One more thing that I LOVED about this story is that on the website for the book you can download two songs (well, two versions of the same song-Sixteen Moons) that Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl wrote for the book. It is featured in the book and you can listen to it all the way at the bottom of the home page of the Beautiful Creatures website.

This is the trailer for the book: