Halo

Author: Alexandra Adornetto

Series: Halo Book #1

Genres: Preteen, Romance, Paranormal/Angels.

Publisher: Feiwel and Friends.

Released: August 31, 2010

Summary: courtesy of goodreads.com Three angels – Gabriel, the warrior; Ivy, the healer; and Bethany, the youngest and most human – are sent by Heaven to bring good to a world falling under the influence of darkness. They must work hard to conceal their luminous glow, superhuman powers, and, most dangerous of all, their wings, all the while avoiding all human attachments.

Then Bethany meets Xavier Woods, and neither of them is able to resist the attraction between them. Gabriel and Ivy do everything in their power to intervene, but the bond between Xavier and Bethany seems too strong. Then comes the brooding and popular new transfer, Jake Thorn... who just so happens to be in Bethany's class. Something about Jake seems to be hiding something darker, something more powerful than expected. That thing, and Xavier, distracts Bethany to a point that Gabriel and Ivy are concerned.

The angel’s mission is urgent, and dark forces are threatening. Will love ruin Bethany or save her?

For Fans Of: Hush, Hush, Fallen, The Mortal Instruments, Angelfall, and Angelfire.

My Review: In my angel genre obsession, I came across this book. I fell instantly in love with the cover. It is very beautiful. However I wasn’t too thrilled with the actual story.

Why I loved it:

1. The story of three angels coming down to help a town that is showing signs of darkness. And one of the angels is an Archangel. Usually no one ever writes an archangel into their story making them out nicer than other stories portray them. That was refreshing.

2. Having the story from a ‘new’ angel’s point of view. I liked how Alexandra described the feeling of having a tangible body was new to Bethany. It made me think of what it would be like to be human for the first time. Makes you enjoy being human all the more.

Reasons this book just didn’t fly with me:

1. Once again I dislike lead girls being portrayed as weak. I understand that Bethany is a new angel and hasn’t ever been to Earth before and this is a new experience for her, but it comes to the point that if you’re from Heaven, wouldn’t you see how the humans on Earth act and behave and know that we aren’t all good? Bethany was too trusting in the humans. This leads to my next number.

2. Angels are full of good. So wouldn’t they be able to sense if something was wrong or not of goodly origins? Bethany has a terrible sense of what’s good and bad. Like when she meets Jake. Shouldn’t she have been able to sense that something bad followed him around? Instead she trusts him too much. She sees too much good in humans.

3. I could tell that Alexandra wrote this when she was really young. It had a very Jr. High/early High School feel to it. I felt like her writing was too juvenile. I would imagine this book would be an excellent read for the younger age. Being a librarian I wouldn’t have cataloged Halo as young adult. It’s definitely clean enough for the younger generation.