Need

Zara Whites has moved just to Maine after witnessing the death of her stepfather. She believes she has a stalker who has also shown up in Maine. There’s something strange about him: he leaves gold dust everywhere he goes. By working with her new friends, she discovers what he wants and how to stop him.

The cover of this book features gold-dusted lips set on a pale face, and dead forest branches creeping up the figure’s neck. I didn’t like the story very much. It’s Twilight redone. As I read, I found the writing to be corny and the plot line to be grating. The plot was so predictable that I could predict the entire story within 30 pages.

I found Zara and the other characters to be superficial, and their conversations to be almost painful to read. Neither of them seem to remember (or know) who they are. I felt it was hard to connect to the characters and their story. This, along with the lack of real depth and meaningful dialogue, left me feeling disappointed.

Primitive urges propel author pixies to target humans, making it hard to empathize with them and painting them as flat antagonists. As a result, it’s difficult to sympathize with them, and they appear one-dimensional villains. It makes Zara’s struggle against them less interesting and meaningful. Though the story contains werewolves, were-eagles, and were-tigers, their significance is not great.

This novel lacks depth in every part - it glosses everything over (except for the meaningless conversations between Zara and her friends). The story lacks a real plot and characters feel hollow and flat. Even the setting is generic and uninteresting.

Overall, this novel is a disappointing read.