Beautifully Broken

Sherry Soule

Okay, so I’m a teenage girl who thinks about fashion and boys and maybe school, and about how uncool my parents are.  Then I discover I am descended from witches and I have a Destiny (yeah, with a capital D).  And no chance for a normal life.  Ever.  Not that I’m likely to live long enough for that to be an issue, because I live in a town where paranormal is the norm.  Let the can-my-life-get-any-suckier begin.

Meet Shiloh Ravenwolf.  She sees things in the shadows.  She lives in Whispering Pines, California, which is rumored to be cursed.  Children have been disappearing in the town.  Sometimes close together and sometimes not.  This has plagued this small town and caused law enforcement to enforce a curfew to ward off the “serial killings” that have been happening.  Only one problem with that theory is that there have been no bodies of the missing found.

Shiloh is almost sixteen and is almost done with school for the summer.  When she searches for a summer job at the board at school, she sees a position for an assistant to help with the reconstruction of Ravenhurst Manor.  This would help Shiloh get closer to her dream of being an architect.  She is kind of leery of accepting the job at first because of Trent Donovan and this house is rumored to be haunted.

She first sees Trent at church and instantly has a crush on him.  He has recently moved back to Ravenhurst Manor with his father.  Trent is described as being the “mysterious new guy in town” and “scandalous.”  Throughout this book, Shiloh is trying to figure out what the curse is on Whispering Pines and how to remove it before more kids end up disappearing.  Trent’s uncle, who is also her boss, Evans, becomes her mentor in the paranormal.  On top of all the magick, demons, curses and ghosts, there are the normal teenage experiences like arguments with the popular girl at school and romance.

That’s right folks, Shiloh Ravenwolf is cursed.  She can see the recently departed and other monsters from the underworld.  Yeah, I know…throw me in a padded cell.

  The Goodreads synopsis:

Thirteenth daughter. Heritage witch. Demon slayer.

They say every town has its secrets, but that doesn’t even begin to describe Whispering Pines. The townsfolk are a superstitious lot and the mystical disappearance of a local teen has everyone murmuring about a centuries old witch’s curse.

Sixteen-year-old Shiloh Ravenwolf is a heritage witch from the Broussard family, a family both destined and cursed. When she takes a summer job at Ravenhurst Manor, she discovers a ghost with an agenda. That’s where she meets the new town hottie, Trent Donovan, and immediately becomes spellbound by his charms. Yet she is determined to discover the connection between them before it’s too late.

Finally, Shiloh's met someone who is supercute and totally into her, but Trent may be the next victim on the supernatural hit list. And Shiloh is the only person with the power to save him. Complicated much?

It sucks to have a destiny, especially since Shiloh would rather spend her summer being a normal girl who worries about clothes and boys, not the supernatural. But she’s never been normal and the stranger things become the more her own magical senses awaken.

With cryptic messages from a pesky wraith, she will begin to understand the mysterious significance of the strange mark branded on her wrist, and decide how much she's willing to sacrifice to protect the other teenagers in town.

Unfortunately, for Shiloh, not all ghosts want help crossing over. Some want vengeance.

This is just too much. I mean, a month ago my life’s like, oh—crap—a pop quiz!  Today it’s oh—crap, it’s the skulking wraith and I’m on some supernatural hit list.  And I am so ready to tell her, “Resolve whatever issues are keeping you in limbo and leave me the hell alone!”

This book reminds me of a scary movie that you are watching and you are shouting at the main character “DON’T LOOK BEHIND THAT DOOR!!!”   It is thrilling and intense.  Soule envelops you in the plot and made this book a real page turner.  There are so many emotions that are happening between the characters, it is hard not to be immersed in this story.  You never know what is going to happen next.  I love that it is so unpredictable. 

I’ve been a witch for—what? Well…technically, my entire life, but actually, only a few months. I’m still learning spells and magick. And I have no idea what I’m doing.

UPCOMING BOOKS

The Spellbound Series is one series that I am anxiously awaiting the next book, Beautifully Haunted, which is said to be released on November 30, 2011. This synopsis came from Sherry's website:

Shiloh Ravenwolf isn’t your typical teenager. Even though, she loves to shop, enjoys gossiping with her friends, and thinks her parents are totally uncool. Deep down, Shiloh knows she isn’t normal. There’s the gift of Sight (Yes, she can see dead people), the magical powers—oh!—and the demon slaying. Let’s not forget her supernatural training with her uber cool mentor Evans, where Shiloh resolves to learn more about the dark curse inhabiting Whispering Pines. But when she embarks on a dangerous journey to seek out the town’s insidious origins, the mystery of her family’s past deepens, and she is again thrust into Ravenhurst Manor’s nightmare world.

To complicate things, she's torn between two hotties, Trent and Dante. And Shiloh must face her biggest challenge yet—and it’s not deciding which crush to take to the prom.

No, she must decide which boy will live and which one will die…

Soule also has another series coming out that sounds really good and I am putting on my to be read list.  It is called Forever Knight.  According to her website, it will be released in October 2011.  This is the Goodreads synopsis of that book:

Elizabeth Blackburn doesn’t believe in fate or the supernatural until she moves into Cliffside Manor and begins having nightmares about a woman who was murdered in the house.

Determined to unlock secrets that have remained hidden for centuries, Elizabeth is plunged into an otherworldly mystery that not even she can explain away, not to mention, her uncontrollable attraction to the former owner, Dorian Knight.

As the history of the Knight family curse begins to unravel, tensions heighten and old secrets turn deadly. Even though Dorian wants nothing to do with Elizabeth and goes out of his way to make that very clear–she can’t let it go...even if it kills her.

Sherry Soule is an author that I will definitely keep tabs on.