Fallen by Lauren Kate

Luce Price killed a boy…except, she believes she didn’t, even though she can’t remember anything about the night it happened; nonetheless, she is shipped off to a reform school where she meets a number of screwed up kids, all forms of communication barring a fifteen minute phone call once per week are banned, and cameras capture every movement. One of the screwed up kids is Daniel Grigori, who flips her off at their first meeting, yet who Luce feels drawn to…almost as though they know each other, yet she’s never met him before…is she really crazy? 

I really don’t know what happened to Kate’s writing between The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove and this, but whatever it was, I want to hug it because her writing has improved so much – Fallen was actually readable, and didn’t get thrown down multiple times in disgust! Fallen is by no means a masterpiece, and Kate still far from what call an author, but I liked it so much more than Betrayal, which admittedly isn’t saying much as I abhorred Betrayal. So. Much.

Fallen was quite slow to get going, could have easily cut a hundred pages of Luce wallowing in self pity, and is further evidence that Pretty Covers Disguise Horrible Books; but seriously, that cover is stunning (bar the quote from P.C. Cast *shudders*), as are the entire series’ covers – I can’t wait to see Rapture’s (yes, there is a fourth one). Sadly the cover is the best thing about Fallen though: we have the typical cliché of the two hottest boys in school who fall hopelessly in lurve with our stunning protagonist even though she has no personality to speak of – she likes to think of herself as smart, but of course falls into the Too Stupid To Live category, and whines the entire way through the book about the scary shadows that follow her, and the fact that Daniel seems to hate her.

 The ‘villain’ was laughably cliché and there isn’t much plot to speak of until the last few pages where it is horribly rushed and predictable but consists namely of A) What is up with Daniel (and also Luce for falling in love with him because he flips her off at their first meeting, which naturally leads to her stalking him out and breaking into his personal record), B) What happened the night Luce’s crush died in a mysterious fire that Luce herself can’t remember anything about, despite possibly causing it, and C) What are the annoying shadows that Luce repeatedly sees and moans about – these mysteries are what power you to keep reading, and Kate annoyingly knows this and refuses to divulge the answers until the last few pages, where we get ridiculous explanations.

 The ‘reform’ school that was Sword & Cross couldn’t have been any less reform – their major punishment was setting impossibly long essays for homework and keeping the kids in the same room all day; whilst their security cameras were easily disabled, and remained that way, and the extremely dangerous psychotic kids were allowed free run of the grounds – if only Kate had bothered to do some research, especially in angel mythology, then Fallen might have actually been somewhat alright.

 Despite all of this, for some reason I can't put my finger on, I found myself almost enjoying reading Fallen, and I even borrowed the sequel, Torment, though I can’t for the life of me figure out why.

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[SYNOPSIS: There’s something achingly familiar about Daniel Grigori.
Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price’s attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He’s the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.
Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce–and goes out of his way to make that very clear–she can’t let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret . . . even if it kills her.]