The day in which I get 13 to Life

Who: Shannon Delany

What: 13 to life

Where: Barnes and Noble Amazon Book Depository

When: June 22, 2010

Why: Been promoting like crazy, wanted my own copy. Also, Debut Author Challenge

How: Bought

Everything about Jessie Gillmansen’s life changed when her mother died. Now
even her hometown of Junction is changing. Mysterious dark things are happening.
All Jessie wants is to avoid more change. But showing a hot new guy around
Junction High, she’s about to discover a whole new type of change. Pietr
Rusakova is more than good looks and a fascinating accent—he’s a guy with a
dangerous secret. And his very existence is sure to bring big trouble to
Jessie’s small town. It seems change is the one thing Jessie can’t avoid…

REVIEW:

I've raved about this endlessly on twitter, the blog and now it's finally in my possession. And it was everything I expected (which was it being totally awesome).
The first 50 pages were kinda slow for me and I was getting very worried that I wouldn't like it as much as I thought I would. But I persisted, because Shannon Delany is awesome and I had heard so many good things about this book! And it's a good thing I did because after those pages the plot and the action really started to pick it.

Shannon has a type of writing that isn't beautifully written, but it's real. Jessie's thoughts, emotions, reactions, all of them I felt were things I would have done or thought if I was in her situation. Even in paranormal romance, I like being able to relate to my characters and feel their pain. And I was able to do that with Jessie and Pietr. I will never be able to understand the full pain of their losses, but it helped how Shannon portrayed it. It helped me divulge better into the emotions and horror of losing someone you love...and being there to witness it.

While about werewolves, this is unlike any other werewolf novel I've read. The "mythology" around werewolves is scientific and surrounded by Russian culture. Though it doesn't explain a lot about how the werewolves came to be and more specific things about them, I'm eager to read and learn more about this and it didn't irritate me.

While I did find some secondary characters flat (the girls, for example), the ones I didn't find flat was the Rusakova family! They were all lovable (some more than others) and I just wanted to find out more! Especially Max. Please Shannon, let him be in Secrets and Shadows a lot more than he is in 13 to Life. I LOVED Max. And his words are my favorite quote:

"You have to hold your arm shoulder length or above, it really triangulates
the body."

Ah, he is such a dog (no pun intended...ok kinda) Alexi was also incredibly mysterious and I'm inclined to know more about him and his motives, since they don't get explained much in the first book.
I felt that the ending was a bit rushed, as if everything happened too neatly and quickly. But I guess it fit for it, because I couldn't imagine such a tension-heated action-packed werewolf-loving book with a slow ending!
So in the end I rate it: AMAZINGNESS

Comment? Discuss? Happy Reading!
-Harmony B.

p.s Sarah is such a stupid whore. Hate her, hate her, Hated her since the beginning. Urghh.

ETA:

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And Thank YOU guys!