Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

Authors: Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Release Date: 12/1/2009
Number of Pages: 576
ISBN-10: 0316042676
ISBN-13: 978-0316042673

From the Publisher:

There were no surprises in Gatlin County.

We were pretty much the epicenter of the middle of nowhere.
At least, that's what I thought.
Turns out, I couldn't have been more wrong.
There was a curse.
There was a girl.
And in the end, there was a grave.

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she's struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.

My thoughts:

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Beautiful Creatures. The protagonist is a sixteen year old boy named Ethan Wate. Most of what I read is told from a female’s perspective and I found the male POV a refreshing change.

Ethan is living the small town life in Gatlin, SC. Having grown up in a small southernish town myself I could relate to a lot of his complaints. He is struggling with normal teenage issues until Lena Duchannes shows up and throws him for a loop. Lena is new in town and also the niece of the town shut in, Macon Ravenwood. This little tidbit causes the locals of Gatlin to ostracize poor Lena even more. If you weren’t born and raised in Gatlin you don’t stand much of a chance of being befriended by the locals. Lena is different than the other girls in Gatlin and Ethan finds himself infatuated with the mysterious new girl. Ethan and Lena quickly discover they share a strange connection that neither can explain. The connection began in a reoccurring dream both have been having. The dream seems to point to events that will occur on Lena’s 16th birthday. Lena comes from a long line of Casters (aka witches) and the day she turns 16 is also the day she’ll become either a light caster or a dark caster. Lena is terrified of what is to come and Ethan is determined to help change her fate.

I loved that they packed a little history lesson into this novel. It made for a more interesting read. The characters were also likeable.  Ethan is a book lover and talks about his love of reading several times in Beautiful Creatures. I always love to read books about books. I must say my favorite characters after Ethan were his three elderly aunts. The conversations between them were humorous and had me chuckling out loud.

I'm looking forward to seeing where Garcia and Stohl go with this series.