Book Review: Fated by Alyson Noel.

Product details:
Publisher: MacMillan Children's Books.
Release date: May 24th 2012.
Paperback, 448  pages.
Rating: 2½ out of 5.
Ages: 12+
Source: Received from publisher for review.

Strange things are happening to Daire Santos. Crows mock her, glowing people stalk her, time stops without warning, and a beautiful boy with unearthly blue eyes haunts all her dreams. Fearing for her daughter’s sanity, Daire’s mother sends her to live with the grandmother she’s never met. A woman who recognizes the visions for what they truly are—the call to her destiny as a Soul Seeker—one who can navigate the worlds between the living and dead.

There on the dusty plains of Enchantment, New Mexico, Daire sets out to harness her mystical powers. But it’s when she meets Dace, the boy from her dreams, that her whole world is shaken to its core. Now Daire is forced to discover if Dace is the one guy she's meant to be with...or if he’s allied with the enemy she's destined to destroy.

As one of the first post-Twilight YA books I read I will always have a soft spot for Alyson Noel’s Evermore. While the rest of the Immortals series was a struggle for me at times, I loved that first book, and so I was hoping for equally good things from this new venture of hers. With its amazing premise and gorgeous cover art, I really thought I was onto a good thing with Fated (Soul Seekers #1).  I thought nothing could go wrong.  And I thought that surely I wouldn’t be faced with another Ever Bloom.  Surely she couldn’t happen twice…

If, like me, you thought Ever was annoying, then just wait till you meet Daire, because she makes Ever seem like a pleasant dream.   I totally understand that it can take some time to connect with a character, but from start to finish, I didn’t like Daire, finding her all round shallow and spoiled. A total brat.  As the daughter of a Hollywood make-up artist, Daire lives an enviable life, travelling around the world and making out with the hot young things of Hollywood on a regular basis. And this could be fun to read about, but it’s not, because it’s Daire, and she’s just not an easy girl to like.

If the paranormal element of this book had hooked me, I could have gotten past my issues with Daire, but I found Fated to be cliché, formulaic, slow in pace and repetitive. Oh, so repetitive. Alyson Noel is a superstar YA writer – she’s sold a gazillion books, and so she’s obviously employing a formula that works – but this one just didn’t work for me. From Daire’s visions, to her dreams, to those twin brothers with the icy blue eyes, to the very strange part of the book where Daire starts experiencing life through the eyes of the cockroach… None of it worked.

Usually when nothing is working I can at least count on a hot book boy to save the day, right? Not here. Dace and Cade are twin brothers. One is good, one is evil, and apologies, but the only thing I can really recall about them is that they have these amazing piercing icy-blue eyes, a fact that is mentioned dozens and dozens of times throughout the book. OK, I get it; they have those Ian Somerhalder eyes. Hot. I don’t need to hear it all the time.

I hung on in there with the Immortals, but it’s safe to say that I won’t be doing the same with the Soul Seekers series.  There are unanswered questions at the end of this book, of course, but I’m not going back there, not even to find out the secrets of the Echo, because if I have to read about those freakin’ icy-blue eyes one more time…!