Page count: 400 pages
Rating: 2 stars
Date begun: June 10, 2010
Date finished: June 11, 2010
Hush, Hush has an absolutely gorgeous cover. It drew me in, it intrigued me, it convinced me that I had to read the book. Sadly, it is a poor imitation of another book with a gorgeous cover that enticed me a few years ago, Stephenie Meyer's Twilight. I will freely admit that I'm still not entirely sure what made me read and re-read the first three Twilight-novels like an addict in frantic need of a crack-fix (I suspect there may be something soaked into the pages that makes your judgement weaken), but nonetheless, my inner fourteen-year-old took control, and I was hooked. So very hooked. Until Breaking Dawn came out, and I was cured. There are limits to how much I will suspend my critical faculties.
Hush, Hush is the story of Nora Grey, whose father was mysteriously killed a year or so back, and whose mother is mostly absent as she has to work lots to support them. Nora is sensible and studious, and has a bitchy friend who seems not to actually like her very much. I was never entirely sure why Nora and Vee were friends, but judging from her other actions in this book, Nora is just a sucker for punishment. One day, Nora is unexpectedly partnered with the new and mysterious kid in school, Patch Cipriano, in biology. He is in turns enigmatic, rude and downright threatening, and while Nora tries to get her biology teacher to let her switch places, she has no such luck. Nora is both attracted to and slightly scared by Patch, and things start getting weird and dangerous, and Nora is not entirely sure she isn't losing her mind. It suddenly seems like she's being stalked, she keeps having what appear to be strange hallucinations and near death experiences, new slightly-ominous dudes transfer to her school, and everything seems to circle back to the mysteries surrounding Patch.
Nora was an annoying, inconsistently written character. She is calm and sensible one moment, and TSTL (too stupid to live) the next. While supposedly smart and independent, she kept making some idiotic choices. Time and time again. Patch was actually a genuinely intriguing anti-hero, once more was revealed about him. Nora is a complete twit for continuing to seek him out, especially after it's been revealed to her by more than one person, Patch included, that he is really dangerous for her to be around. That's not his fault though, and in another story, he could probably have been quite cool.
As well as the obvious likenesses to Twilight, this book reminded me of another angel love triangle book I read and reviewed some months ago, Fallen. Both books are derivative of Meyer's book, and while I will freely admit that I understand why so many people hate and are disturbed by the Twilight-saga, I found the books very entertaining ( the fourth one is hugely entertaining in an entirely different way), and they continue to be a guilty pleasure of mine. Sadly, this also leads to a lot of inferior attempts by other writers to become the next Stephenie Meyer, of which this, and Fallen, are examples. They are not awful, I finished both books, but neither delivered what their lovely covers promised.
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