The plot as I read it: Angels come to Earth to fight the Devil's works. Girl, who is very young in angel terms, is a rookie and easily relates to humans, so much so she a) falls in love with a boy and b) risks the angels' mission in doing so. Good fights evil in the form of secondary (and a mostly late addition to the story) boy, wins at least for the moment, and the angels can still go about their business. End part one.
Okay, not so bad, except that it takes nearly 500 pages to do that alone and the majority of the book is details, details, details. So much so that slogging through them all seems so much more important than having a plot. In other words, it's a bit like reading your typical Twi-alike. Lots of words, not so much story.
As for characterization, Beth, our lovely protagonist, is interesting in her own way being the most human of them all (and she does, consistently, read like a teenage girl in love for the first time- gratingly so). Her companions, the warrior angel Gabriel (yes, of biblical fame) and Ivy, the beautiful motherly/big sister type who constantly seems to have no end of admirers should she leave the house, are either rather rigid in their actions or almost un-angelic. Gabriel reads more like the protective yet hott older brother who is emotionally unavailable while Ivy is the consummate older sister who seems blissfully unaware of her attractiveness and is very good about giving motherly circles when necessary, even if it's in a stern manner.
As for the humans, most of them are really secondary. Other than Beth's friend from the get-go Molly who seems to be the punkish rebel type, the evil Jake Thorn (name foreshadowing much?) and Xavier, the object of Bethany's affection, every human character is more or less a pawn in the events, pretty much just being there to be there. Xavier's back story makes him a bit more interesting than most just because he's lost a whole lot (dead girlfriend in a fire), but even that is hardly important after he sees Bethany, the most beautiful new girl ever to invade a school. The two get along just fine, but have the usual cliche relationship of girl and boy fall madly in love, he easily accepts her differences, and she basically cures him of his brooding past. The fact that his family is ridiculously perfect is a little annoying and when the two break up because of an incident with bad boy Jake, the plot feels so much like reading Twilight (Jake = Jacob anyone?, or a fanfiction version of Snape based on his initial description: 'He was tall and lean, and his straight dark hard reached over his shoulders. His cheek bones were sharp, giving him a gaunt, hollow look. His nose drooped slightly at the tip, and his brilliant jade-green eyes gazed out beneath low-set brows' (260)).
The whole Bella/Jacob/Edward triangle that it's easy to forget what book you're reading.
So, while the book looks pretty and has some decent writing, most of it reads the same as what's come before. A nice change of setting and paranormal abnormalcy (angels instead of vamps) shows that the paranormal romance genre, which I pointed out at the beginning of the year, is still switching from the dark side to the light side. That is, vamps and werewolves are on their way out for the things with wings: angels. And since there appears to be more to come (also from Lauren Kate and Becca Fitzpatrick), we could be dealing with angels for a long time to come.
Read and Your Own Risk unless you love love love Twi-alikes.
Works Cited.
Adornetto, Alexandra. Halo. New York: Feiwal and Friends, 2010.
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