Spell Bound - Rachel Hawkins

Synopsis: I'm not putting the synopsis here. Because it in itself is spoilery if you haven't read the 1st two books. In fact, while I will do my best to keep out the spoilers in this review I still want to warn you that, while it is not my intention, sometimes they still happen. If you want to read what this book is all about, click on the cover to go to IndieBound and read the synopsis there. If you're coming here to see if Spell Bound is worth continuing the series, read on! and if you're here to see what the Hex Hall series is all about then exercise caution. (And might I suggest that you pick up Hex Hall as fast as you possibly can? Because if you haven't read these books yet, you're missing out on a whole lot of awesome.)

Hex Hall and Demonglass were up there with some of the first books I ever reviewed. Okay, I reviewed them a little over a month after I started the blog, but since it feels like I've been doing this forever, it feels like one of the first ones. Anyway, I just went and check on that review to see what I said about it (you can read it too if you wanna) and I had to giggle a little bit. Mostly because I pulled out this quote from Hex Hall:

“Jenna gave me a sympathetic look and cleared our empty plates. ‘Sorry in advance for what you’re about to see.’
‘What?’  I asked as the dining hall began to empty. ‘What’s going to happen?’
Jenna just shook her head. ‘Let’s just say you may regret that second piece of cake.’
Oh my God. Regret cake? Whatever was about to happen must be truly evil.”

And then said that if you couldn't see why that's awesome, we couldn't be friends. Which I still maintain. The reason I'm digging up the past is because, like it's hard to know a person without knowing where they come from - it's hard to talk about Spell Bound without revisiting where it came from.

Since all convention and structure has already been thrown out the window here - I'm going to do something a little different. I'm going to go back to the lists I used to make of reasons I loved a book - both for nostalgia and because I'm having a hard time articulating all the love I have for this book without letting some stuff slip. Because, really, I only have two complaints - one I can't tell you about (and it's not  a complaint as much as a HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?!?! type-thing) and the other one is that it needed to be longer (or just to go on forever and ever).

So - 8 (of the countless) Reasons I love Spell Bound:

1. Sophie Mercer is one of my favorite heroines. EVER. Everything that comes out of her mouth is pure awesome.

2. Archer Cross.

4. Cal. Sigh.

5. Archer Cross

6. Clearly I love the characters. Every single one of them is huggable (well, the ones who aren't villains anyway - they're more of the run the other way sort). I love Jenna too, can't forget the vamp who loves pink.

7. I love Sophie and Archer together. So stinkin' much. They're so in sync, and their verbal banter just makes you feel like they get each other. I also very much appreciate that they fight over some pretty serious issues, because it just makes their relationship feel genuine. They like to sugar coat things with sarcasm, but there's real stuff in there too and that doesn't get completely swept away.

8. Let's face it, the paranormal genre is crowded (in a rock concert kind of way, not in a I need my coffee and there are too many people in the coffee shop way...). But, this series stands out as unique and exceptional. It's so refreshing. In a dark world, Sophie and gang bring the flashlights to play flashlight tag. On the way they just so happen to kick some butt.

Ok - so bad metaphors and a lot of incoherent spewing (seriously, this post got out of hand) aside - all I really want to say is - Spell Bound = Awesome.