Book Review: Hunted

Hunted by P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast (A House of Night Novel)

Description: Zoey and her friends saw the bird man Kalona unleashed on the school and its participants by headmistress Neferet at the end of the last House of Night Novel. They escape into the world only to be forced back into the school.

Zoey has always had special abilities and her loyalty to her friends as well as Nyx has served her well. She now is surrounded by different vampires then the kind that were originally created when teens like herself transformed. She knows it is up to her friends and herself to save the world. Kalona is out to get them - especially Zoey and she is the only one that can figure out a way to stop him.

Zoey has to figure out if all of those who seem to be her friends really are. Are the red fledglings someone she can trust? What about the students who are still back at the House of Night? Zoey has been burned before can she figure out who is good and who is bad in time?


Thoughts: I liked this series when I first started reading it. As time has progressed I have grown to like it more and more. You don't know who is the good guy and who are the bad guys. You instead focus on relationships of teens - within groups as well as individual friendships and romantic relationships. Tie all that in with a girl who maybe has a little too much responsibility and it may have hurt her in these relationships. But she is loyal - both to her friends as well as Nyx - the goddess.

The way things are progressing Zoey learns to rely on her friends a little more and more and that group is ever expanding. The red vampires, her special guards, as well as her circle. The story is interesting and inventive and if anything the only thing wrong with it is that it ends - and you keep wanting more.

I personally would recommend starting at the beginning of the series - as I think many of the things in it would be things you don't necessarily need to know about - but would start out as confusing (why are some of the teens dead, how do they become vampires, who Kalona and Neferet are and what is up with Heath the human teen who seems to be attached to Zoey).


What genre would you consider this?
Paranormal/Teen

Overall:

Untamed

Untamed by P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast (A House of Night Novel)

What was this book about?

Zoey Redbird is a vampire fledgling in the House of Night. She has been surrounded by a merry group of friends who have now abandoned her because of her keeping secrets. They don’t understand why she didn’t tell them things. Especially the things about Stevie, Zoey’s roommate who never made the conversion to full vampire, she instead died. But she really isn’t dead – she is a special sort of fledgling that Zoey and her friends brought back from craziness.

Zoey knows the Neferet is out to get her and her friends but she doesn’t know her plan. When things start happening on campus that leave Zoey with an uneasy feeling she knows that her friends and her must do something. With unlikely friend and old time enemy Aphrodite she must stop Neferet before everyone is hurt (especially her).

What did you think about the book?

I love the House of Night Novels. I was actually sad when I finished this book – not because it was bad – but instead because it was done.. And I would now have to wait who knows how long for the next book in the series. I can’t wait to see what Zoey and her friends are going to do with what has been left for them to deal with.

Despite the cliffhanger – I really felt like the book ended at an appropriate place (even if I wish it could keep going and going). I would suggest that anyone who likes these sort of paranormal novels – get past the fact that it is supposed to be a teen book and start at the beginning of the series. It will be worth it.

What genre would you consider this?
Paranormal

Overall:

Questions for you!:
Over the series have you begun to like Aphrodite? Do you trust her? Do you feel that these sort of crossover Teen/Adult Paranormal books are something you enjoy?

Chosen

Chosen by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast (House of Night Novel 3)

What was this book about?
Zoey is not only a vampire, but she is stuck in a school where she can’t even trust her mentor and teacher. She is conflicted over her three boyfriends and can’t choose between them all. Her best friend and roommate Stevie Rae is now one of the undead, after not having completed her change. Thankfully Stevie Rae is different the rest of the undead, she seems to still have a piece of her soul and humanity. Zoey needs to figure out how to save Stevie Rae from this awful threat.

Meanwhile, at her school vampyres are turning up dead. They don’t know who or what is causing it. Who will be next?

What was your favorite part about this book?
I just really enjoy the “House of Night” as a place and a dynamic.

What was your least favorite part about this book?
I feel things were left to unresolved. That in some ways this was just a part 1 of a two part single book. But it isn’t. So now I have to wait for the next one.

What genre would you consider this?
Paranormal Fiction

Overall: B, Still a great book!

Spoilers: Zoey has sexual relations in this novel and if that is something you really don’t want your children reading/knowing about then you may have problems with that. In no way is it graphic.

Betrayed

Betrayed by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast (House of Night Novel 2)

What was this book about?
Zoey has begun to fit in at her school. She has four best friends who care for her and would seem to do anything for her. Then she finds out several human teenagers that she knew when she was just a normal teenage girl, are missing and have been killed. And it looks like they were killed by vampyres.

She has to find out what is really happening to everyone before those that she cares about are hurt.

What was your favorite part about this book?

They definitely didn’t have books like this when I was a teenager – and that is a bad thing. These books are entertaining enough that I wouldn’t say you need to b a teen to enjoy them. You just have to like the subject.

What was your least favorite part about this book?

I knew the whole time that she was going to be betrayed by someone. So I spent the whole book looking into everything and it wasn’t easy for me to like her friends, boyfriends, anyone because I was looking for them to be a traitor.

What genre would you consider this?
Paranormal

Overall: B+, again another great book.

Marked

Marked by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast (House of Night Novel 1)

What was this book about?
Zoey is a normal teenager who just wants to fit in with her family, her friends, and her school. That is not going to happen. She is marked as a vampyre and must immediately go to the House of Night under threat of death. If she doesn’t go there she will die from the genetic mutation that makes her a vampyre. She is marked by the goddess of the vampyre’s, Nyx, who wants Zoey to be her eyes and ears. She must evil in her new school, while maintaining the courage that the goddess knew she had.

What was your favorite part about this book?
It was an amusing read. Seeing teenagers and how they interact brings back a lot of my own personal feelings about how those you meet at that time have much more to them then you will ever know.

What was your least favorite part about this book?

This book is marketed at teens. I truly think that teens will enjoy it but I wouldn’t recommend it for someone that was under 12 as it does have drug and sex mentioned in it.

What genre would you consider this?
Paranormal

Overall: B+

If I was to nominate this book for an award it would be: Best Series to Start Reading while waiting for the next Stephanie Meyer Book.