Review: Hallowed by Cynthia Hand

Hallowed by Cynthia Hand
Published: January 17th, 2012; HarperTeen
403 pages

From Goodreads:
For months part-angel Clara Gardner trained to face the raging forest fire from her visions and rescue the alluring and mysterious Christian Prescott from the blaze. But nothing could prepare her for the fateful decisions she would be forced to make that day, or the startling revelation that her purpose—the task she was put on earth to accomplish—is not as straightforward as she thought.

Now, torn between her increasingly complicated feelings for Christian and her love for her boyfriend, Tucker, Clara struggles to make sense of what she was supposed to do the day of the fire. And, as she is drawn further into the world of part angels and the growing conflict between White Wings and Black Wings, Clara learns of the terrifying new reality that she must face: Someone close to her will die in a matter of months. With her future uncertain, the only thing Clara knows for sure is that the fire was just the beginning.

My Rating:
5 stars

My Thoughts:

Let me just start off by saying, I finished this book in one sitting. I get bored easily, so if a book doesn’t capture my attention and keep it I eventually put it down and take a break. If it’s a pretty good book, I’ll probably pick it up again later on the very same day. If it’s bad, I’ll agonize over whether or not to finish it at all. In the case of Hallowed, I had no problem finishing the second book in Clara’s story.

The book started off great, was great in the middle, and ended amazingly. There weren’t any epic battles in this book (which, for a YA paranormal book is pretty strange) but that didn’t matter, because the story was emotionally charged enough as is.

It seems like Cynthia Hand has a talent for writing secrets into a story and systematically dropping them like bombs. The thing I loved most about Hallowed was that many of these secrets were revealed by the end of the book, to maximum effect (but not all of them, since there is a third book). Some of them I kind of expected, but others were a surprise, one of the main reasons I could not put this book down.

I also really liked that we finally got to see Christian as a real character, instead of the boy Clara had dreams about, and then spent the next few weeks obsessing over. This time, he’s no longer a superficial popular boy, so we get to learn more about him, and less about how darn hot he is (not that I have any complaints against the hotness). I was sad that Tucker didn’t play as big of a part in the second book, but Christian’s larger role was a fine alternative.

My other reason for giving this book a five star rating, is that it almost made me cry. I had to keep myself from bawling because I would have had one of my family members pounding on my bedroom door and asking me what the heck was going on. The only book that has made me actually cry was Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins, but that was mostly because I was just sitting there like “WHAT?!?” as soon as I was done reading it. When it comes to being sad, Hallowed comes in as a close second (but good sad, not everyone-is-dead-and-the-series-is-over sad).

All in all, this book was AMAZING. Angels are a popular theme these days, and I think Cynthia Hand does an incredible job with their back story. It’s original, heart-wrenching, and every single chapter sucks you in and leaves you wanting more. I will be purchasing the third book (Boundless. It has a title! But it doesn’t come out until 2013 D:) as soon as it comes out, so if you haven’t read Hallowed, or it’s prequel, Unearthly, read them ASAP. They’re amazing.