Abandon by Meg Cabot

Title: Abandon
Author: Meg Cabot
Publisher: Scholastic Inc./Point
Release Date: April 26th, 2011
Pages: 320 pages (hardback)
How I Got the Book: Amazon Vine

Though she tries returning to the life she knew before the accident, Pierce can't help but feel at once a part of this world, and apart from it. Yet she's never alone... because someone is always watching her. Escape form the realm of the dead is impossible when someone there wants you back.

But now she's moved to a new own. Maybe at her new school, she can start fresh. Maybe she can stop feeling so afraid.

Only she can't. Because even here, he finds her. That's how desperately he wants her back. She knows he's no guardian angel, and his world isn't exactly heaven, yet she can't stay away... especially since he always appears when she least expects it, but exactly when she needs him most.

But if she lets herself fall any further, she may just find herself back in the one place she most fears: the Underworld.

Review:

Pierce Oliviera drowned when she was fifteen and she hasn't been the same since. When she moved to Isla Huesos, Florida with her mother after her parents' divorce, she hopes to start over and forget about everything that happened in the wake of her temporary death. Too bad John isn't going to let that happen. She doesn't know quite who he is, but she knows that he's not human. Whatever he is, she will have to be cautious of him. If she's not, he may just take her back to the Underworld and keep her there.

Cabot has a rare gift: the ability to keep the reader glued to her books through her writing. She knows just when to stop the chapters so that you've got to turn the page and find out WHAT THE HELL'S GOING ON and every now and then, she'll throw hints out there to make the reader keep going so they'll find out what's going on. Even in the numerous moments where I was irritated with Abandon because thoughts weren't expanded on or flashbacks kept interrupting scenes, I didn't want to stop reading. The plot went like "zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzOMGCLIMACTICSCENEover" for me as it unfolded over three days, but that never bothered me once. Who needs plot or character-driven stories when your style is enough to keep people reading?

Another gift of Cabot's is to write spirited, witty heroines you can't help but cheer for even when they get irritating. This time around, she tried for a more introverted heroine in Pierce. In heroines, I ask for them to be two simple things: flawed and interesting, in that they make me want to learn more about them. Pierce isn't short of her flaws (she's rather slow, selfish and selfless all at once, a little bit of a pushover, doesn't think before acting) and I like that she's not perfect, but she missed the boat on being interesting. She's the same plain heroine I've gotten used to seeing in young adult paranormals. Considering the author and what I know she can do, this makes me sad. I was never sold on John either, or the romance between the two; his mood swings and any lack of romantic development between the two kept me undecided.

Despite being a young adult paranormal and therefore entitled to be a little unbelievable, I had no trouble believing this could be real and happening in our world because of how the very minor characters act and the detailed setting. The nasty things humans will do to one another, like blame the victim of a crime for something that wasn't their fault and persecute each other for being in a program like New Pathways or being the child of someone who was in jail, are all too real. Not that I want to read about people blaming victims or persecuting each other because I think that's wrong and should be changed in real life, but it was exactly what many people would do and I respect that the decision was made to have the people be nasty instead of nice. If they'd been nice, I would have felt something was up and my suspension of disbelief would be broken just like that.

I'm  sad it looks like the sequel will take place largely in the Underworld because considering all the little hints of things to come in Isla Huesos, I would prefer to read about that. What does Alex have planned? (Probably nothing good.) What about our minor characters like Alex and Uncle Chris and the mom, the people who showed some signs of three-dimensional potential? I want to read about them, not Pierce being trapped in the Underworld and most likely romanced by John! My hopes are the romance gets some emergency life injected into it, Pierce stops thinking "I have to help him" because no you don't, and there is more of Pierce's family.

AND IF I SEE THE PHRASE "CHECK YOURSELF BEFORE YOU WRECK YOURSELF" ONE MORE TIME, I AM GOING TO SCREAM BLOODY MURDER.

While it's good to know that Cabot hasn't lost her gift for writing stories that captivate me and keep me reading whenever I have spare time, but the experiment of writing a heroine who is not spunky and witty and such didn't work out very well. I will take serious good word to make me pick up the second volume Underworld. And I mean trusted-reviewer-friends-give-glowing-reviews kind of good. If I may be so excused, I must read a little bit out of the Mediator books on my shelf to make myself feel better. I would prefer Suze over Pierce any day and if you've read the Mediator books, this really says something about Pierce.

3 stars!

What am I reading next?: Beauty Queens by Libba Bray