Extraordinary by Nancy Werlin

Summary

Phoebe finds herself drawn to Mallory, the strange and secretive new girl at school. Soon the two become as close as sisters . . . until Mallory’s magnetic older brother, Ryland, appears. Ryland has an immediate, exciting hold on Phoebe—but a dangerous hold, for she begins to question her feelings about her best friend and, worse, herself. Soon she’ll discover the shocking, fantastical truth about Ryland and Mallory, and about an age-old debt they expect Phoebe to pay. Will she be special enough to save herself.

• Number of pages: 392

Review

Extraordinary made me soooooo frustrated. I really am surprised I got through this book without throwing it in my pool or something drastic like that. I was so disappointed especially after reading Nancy Werlin’s book Impossible. Now THAT book was worth reading. This book had its semi- good moments, but to be honest, they were few. I don’t know what happened with this one. It was a good story, interesting plot . . . what went wrong?

Ah yes, I know! It was the characters! They were created right, but did they have to be like this? I mean, I get that Phoebe was suppose to be self conscious, but this book took that to the extreme. And I understand that fairies were tricking her, but come on people; she did some pretty stupid things on her own. And don’t even get me started on Ryland! The entire time I just wanted to punch that guy in the face. He is like the definition of “evil psycho fairy”. It wasn’t just that he is not the good guy, it’s that he is a complete and honest jerk who was obviously in need of heart. The minor characters of this book were great; it was just the main characters that really, REALLY bugged me. Like a lot. The only one that wasn’t that bad was Mallory, she was ok.

But I can’t blame all of it on the characters. I hate to say it, but this was kind of a snoozer. It was super slow, and it took me twice as long to finish this book than any other book I read. I did however finish it.

And I also got the moral of the book. It’s about what separates ordinary people from extraordinary people. The whole story was like a lesson in that aspect, and it did seem to stick with me. There were times when I was rooting for Phoebe. So adding up everything . . . from 1-10? I’m going to have to give it a 4.

Impossible by Nancy Werlin

Summary

Lucy is seventeen when she discovers that the women of her family have been cursed through the generations, forced to attempt three seemingly impossible tasks or to fall into madness upon their child's birth. But Lucy is the first girl who won't be alone as she tackles the list. She has her fiercely protective foster parents beside her. And she has Zach, whose strength amazes her more each day. Do they have enough love and resolve to overcome an age-old evil?

Number of Pages: 364

Review

A round of applause for Nancy Werlin’s novel Impossible! Many YA books now a days are getting really repetitive and cliché. Werlin definitely thought out-of-the-box when she wrote this book.

Impossible is about Lucy Scarborough’s family curse and her attempt to break it. When she gets pregnant, and finally discovers what this curse actually means and what could happen to her and her baby if she doesn’t try to end it once and for all. Her family and her have until the birth of the baby to succeed in three impossible tasks or else the cycle will start again.

I love when books are based on other things such as folk tales or old songs. To me it seems extra difficult for writers to create their own unique twist to an already existing piece. This book specifically did a great job on that. It took the “Scarborough Fair” ballad and created a puzzling page-turner for readers. It was amazing to see how she looked at the tasks in logical ways, which were: 1. Make me a magical shirt without any seam or needlework 2. Find me an acre of land between the salt water and the seastrand, and 3. Plow it with just a goat’s horn and sow it all over with one grain of corn. To do all this while pregnant? That’s impressive by anyone’s standards! The way Lucy acted during the whole process of breaking the curse was a little too composed. I’m sure any other girl would be freaking out at times, but I guess that is just the way she is. More power to her! There were some graphic moments, and also some very raw emotional moments for her that really drags our your sympathetic side and makes you feel what the characters were feeling. In those moments it felt like there was an empathy link between Lucy and me. Thank goodness she had her family there! Lucy’s family was very interactive during the whole novel, which was good. The author showed a typical, protective family. I found it very reassuring, something normal in the mist of a really, really weird situation. The ending was perfect for this story. It was exciting yet realistic, it didn’t leave me wondering or unsatisfied. Impossible was basically an all around entertaining story so I say that from 1-10? Impossible gets a 7.5!

Oh I almost forgot to comment on the cover! Now, I saw that there was also another cover for this book which is amazing too, but I find that I like this one just a bit more. I love the wind blown hair image, and the background is spectacular, don't ya think?