Swoon

First Impressions: So, as you all know, I am a sucker for books with awesome covers. When I first seen the cover of Swoon, I knew I needed to read this book. Gotta love the pretty cover! The story sounded interesting to me and reminded me a bit like Twilight. The author was kind to send me this book along with Swear, the second book in this series, for my reviews.

First 50 Pages: I had a love/hate relationship with this book from the beginning. While I loved the author’s style of writing and I thought the material was clever and entertaining, the names of the her characters really bothered me. The names were Dice, Sin, Pen, Doll, Con, Marsh, Gel, Crane, El and Em, Duck, Wick, Boz, No and Way. This was extremely distracting and unnecessary. It also made it very difficult for me to be able to connect to any of these characters since I had a hard time following who was who. It wasn’t until I was about ¾ of the way through the book that I was able to tell exactly who was speaking. I’ve been seeing unusual names in books lately and I really wish that this trend would stop.

Plot Points: The initial premise, as seen in the book synopsis, of this book really grabbed my attention and for the most part, it delivered. What I wasn’t expecting was the sexual references and scenes. I know that most teens are driven by their hormones and some practice casual sex. Whatever. That is their prerogative. This story wasn’t so much of a romance as it was borderline erotic. It is very racy for a YA book. It isn’t a bad thing, but I’m not sure how most parents would feel having their child read this book. I don’t think I would want my teenage daughter (if and when I have one) reading this book. There is A LOT of sex. I mean, an absurd amount of sex. This book would be much better suited for an adult or a very mature older teen.

Final Thoughts: Besides the fact that it is overly sensual for a teen novel, the core of the story was very good and like I had said before, the writing style is unique and edgy. This book isn’t going to be for everyone. A more conservative reader and young teens should skip this book, it’s not for them. It’s a decent book and I believe in second chances. I hope that Swear will be less focused on the sex and more focused on, well…just about everything besides sex.