Fallen - Lauren Kate

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 Sword & Cross boarding school in Savannah. He's the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are screwups, and security cameras watch every move.

Except Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce--he goes out of his way to make that very clear. But she can't let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, Luce has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret. . . even if it kills her.

Dangerously exciting and darkly romantic, Fallen is a page-turning thriller and the ultimate love story.

Title: Fallen

Author: Lauren Kate

Genre: Young Adult, Angels

Publisher: Delacorte Press

My Rating: 4/5

I am finding that this book walks a fine line between a love/hate relationship. At first, I didn't like the book, not because of anything overt, but because it seemed like the plot wasn't going anywhere. I'm glad I stuck with it though because once I managed to get past the long drawn out first 150 pages or so it opened up and we finally started to see some action. Even at 150 pages in, there wasn't a lot of action, but at least we start to get some answers, and then more questions. At that point, we get to see more character development, and Luce finally starts interacting (more) with Daniel. It's at least, not a one-sided conversation anymore.

There was a lot of foreshadowing, and then there were the shadows. The shadows seemed to obscure their true intent initially as they didn't do anything, they just imposed their presence from time to time. One couldn't decide if they were bad or indifferent. I won't say anything more on that subject because I don't want to ruin anything for anyone who still has to read the book.

I found that once the book opened up, it slowly gave up it's secrets to the reader; just enough to keep the reader engaged throughout the rest of the book. I found that the further along the story got, the more brilliant it became. It was like Luce was waking up, and therefore we were waking up alongside her. I can't wait to see what happens in the next book. I devoured the latter half of this book and couldn't get enough of it. I thoroughly loved the "bad" characters, as well as the "good" characters. They weren't as defined as one might think.

There are still a lot of questions that haven't been answered, but have been alluded to. I found the ending quite apropos for the book, and it leaves the reader begging for more. (Again, more questions.) I really can't wait to read the next book, and don't know if I can wait until September for it to come out! All in all, it was slow to start, but once it kicked in I was captivated.

This book counts toward the 2010 100+ Reading Challenge hosted over at J. Kaye's/Home Girl's book blog.