Angel - L.A. Weatherly

Angel by L A Weatherly was released by Usborne on 1st October 2010 and it is 512 pages long. Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy for review.

Plot
Being different in high school is not a good thing but Willow can’t help it. She loves to fix cars and has a very unique dress sense but that isn’t all. Willow is also psychic and can look into people’s futures just by holding their hand. She has no idea where her gift came from but plans on using it to help as many people as possible.

The gorgeous and mysterious Alex knows where Willow’s gift comes from but her secret is far more than she could have ever imagined. There are people know what Willow really is and they don’t have friendly feelings towards her. Alex is the only person who seems able to help but he has been brought up to hate everything that Willow is. Will he be able to look past everything he has been taught to see Willow for who she really is?

What I thought
Angel was a book I had been looking forward to for a really long time and I was so excited when the publisher said they were going to send me a copy for review. Even though I knew I had a lot of books that I should have read before Angel, I just couldn’t help myself and I started it straight away and I am damn glad I did now.

L.A. Weatherly’s Angel will change everything you ever thought about when it comes to Angels and what they are. Angels are usually seen as being nice, holy creatures from Heaven but here, that couldn’t be further from the truth. These Angels come from another world, feeding from humans and eventually giving them illnesses like MS or psychological problems. Not exactly the Angels you learn about at school are they? There are so many YA books out there now where the main characters, whether they be vampires, werewolves etc, try to turn into the good guys and repress their instincts to kill but Weatherly has taken the opposite direction and purposely made Angels he bad guys.

Angel is narrated in a very different way compared with everything else I have ever read. Alternating from a first person POV from Willow to a third person POV from Alex was certainly something original to do and once I had gotten used to it, I found it to be a really interesting way to tell the story. I often get bored of books alternating from one character to another in first person as it is done a lot now so I really liked this change from Angel.

Willow was pretty much everything that I could have asked for in a female protagonist. When I first started reading YA novels, I really hated female characters because I found a lot of them were really whiney and annoying but recently, my opinion has changed a lot and I am finding so many more female characters that I absolutely adore. Willow isn’t like all of the other girls at her high school and this was a big part of why I liked her so much. She isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty by fixing cars and really doesn’t seem to care that much about what anyone else thinks of her. Willow is quite at peace with her psychic gift and is determined to help people the best that she can. She’s sweet and innocent with a good head on her shoulders, making her very grounded and sensible which was extremely refreshing.

Alex was a character that I liked from the very beginning. It is clear that he has had far from a perfect childhood and now he has to be an Angel Killer (AK) all on his own. It would be hard to not feel sorry for Alex because of the things he has had to deal with in his life and at a very young age. Alex also isn’t your average YA bad boy. In fact, he’s quite far from being a bad boy. Being an AK kind of makes Alex the good guy considering he is trying to rid the world of these awful creatures. Of course, he does have some bad boy tendencies though which start to come through when he meets Willow.

Because of his upbringing, Alex is quite vulnerable and has part of him that he doesn’t want anyone else to see. He doesn’t want to set himself up for heartbreak so when he feels instantly attracted to Willow, he can’t help but distance himself from her but also for more reasons than that. What I loved the most about Alex was that I ended up thinking so many different things about him. One minute I wanted to give him a big hug and the next I wanted to be right there with him about to kick some angel ass!

The relationship between Willow and Alex was really believable because they aren’t one of those couples who fall in love with each other in the space of five minutes. To begin with, they really hate each other because of what they both are but the journey of them getting to know each other and be at peace with what they both are was a lovely one to follow. The chemistry between them seemed very real and in certain parts, I had myself imagining what would have maybe happened if this had been an adult novel. Anyone who has read it will probably know what I’m talking about.

The story, which is mostly (but so much more than) a road trip across America, is jam packed with excitement and is a fast paced rollercoaster of emotion. When Alex informs Willow that the Church of Angels wont stop until they get to her, she realises that although she knows nothing about him, she has no other option but to get in the car. It really reminds me of that scene in Transformers about regretting your actions in years to come. That one had a car in it too! I’m babbling now though so I’ll get back to Angel. It must have been so hard for Willow to put her trust in the hands of a strange and just as hard for Alex, trying to save everything he has been taught to destroy. As Willow and Alex make a run for it, trying to avoid Angels along the way, they realise that their initial thoughts about each other were probably not right but both are quite stubborn so don’t want to back down. The banter between the two made the story funny at times but also added to the excitement when things weren’t going well.

I was never really sure where the story was going to go, knowing that there will be two more books to come. There were so many surprises along Willow and Alex’s journey that I was kept guessing the whole way through. The ending of Angel leaves a lot to the imagination because there are so many different possibilities as to where the story can go next. I can’t wait to find out what is in store next for Willow and Alex but the path to happiness is sure to have some bumps along the way.

If there is one book you must read this Autumn, this is it! Angel is not a book to be missed!