Short answer? No.
I finally got a chance to read for pleasure today, so I chose Lauren Kate’s novel “Fallen.” It’s been sitting on my bookshelf for nearly a year. I felt bad that I hadn’t even flipped through the pages yet. I wasn’t expecting a whole lot from the book considering it’s overly dramatic cover and sickeningly cliched synopsis.
The good news is: technically, the book is fairly well written. Descriptions of characters, setting, and action are clear, detailed, and provided through exposition as well as action. Most of the story is told through scene and dialogue, rather than summary, and the information about angels is close enough to accurate that any inconsistencies are negligible.
The bad news: the main conflict within the novel smacks of lazy writing. Though dressed up slightly differently, it is the same “will she choose the perfect for her good guy or the broken yet beautiful bad boy” that runs rampant through literature aimed at young women. Twilight, Hunger Games, Vampire Diaries, Clockwork Angel and a thousand more all use this plot device to create tension. Without adding some other motivation to Bella’s, Katniss’, Elena’s, or Tessa’s character, the entire story becomes one-dimensional and boring. The protagonist is supposed to be relatable in some way. He or she is supposed to be someone the reader roots for. All I could think while reading about Luce was, “Girl, you have got to get a hobby that is not obsessing about a dude.”
Which reminds me, Luce as a protagonist frustrated me. I have mentioned before the shortage of active, strong female characters in YA Lit. I have (mostly) accepted the constant use of first love as the motivation for a story in the young adult category, but Luce exists exclusively as an object of that love, rather than an active participant. Not once, in the entire novel, does she take action herself. She is compelled by some unknown force, she is directed by her friends, she is constantly being rescued by an outside influence. She is passive in every situation. There is no character development. Luce Price remains markedly absent from the climactic conflicts and cannot function without her man.
Who, by the way, treats her like shit until page 440. I’m exaggerating a little to make a point, but it is well over half the novel that (spoiler alert!) Daniel is an asshole. Before they even exchange a word, Daniel flips her off and walks away! I am so tired of reading about epic love stories where the guy disrespects his “love” interest with the justification of either keeping her safe or not being good enough. He continues his bizarre behavior by controlling her answers to whether or not she will attend a party and punching a guy, out of nowhere, who kisses her. A kiss he only witnessed because he was following her. This is not acceptable, justifiable, or romantic! It’s creepy, domineering, and, quite frankly, abusive.
Pacing seems to be another major weakness. Over the course of 450 pages, Luce Price, the main character, enrolls in a reform school, makes three best friends and one mortal enemy, attracts the undying devotion of two guys, witnesses the deaths of three people, discovers the world of angels and demons, and finds out she has been reincarnated countless times, but has no memory of her previous lives. Whew! If all of this happened over the course of a few months, fine, I’d be 100% on board, but this is not the case. All of these psychological-foundation-altering revelations occur over the course of a couple of weeks. And by “a couple,” I mean two. Fourteen days. The lack of development over time gives the love story, the driving force of the plot, a “Romeo and Juliet”-esque feel; overly dramatic and severely lacking in substance or motivation. There is an attempt to justify the rush with Luce’s many lives, but I found it to be an inadequate excuse.
Another point of contention is the choice of names. They all seem unnecessarily “purple” or wildly obvious. Like, smack-you-in-the-face-with-a-baseball-bat symbolism. Lucinda Price, Arriane Alter, Gabrielle Givens, Cameron Briel, Daniel Grigori, and Mary Margaret Zane, to name a few. Nowhere in the work is there a Jessica or Ben or Tom or Madison. The ridiculously flowery names give the ones in the Vampire Diaries a run for their money.
I Swear I'm an Adult 