Howdy YAL!

One of the worst books I read last year was What the Spell.  The book had so much promise, teenage witches are sort of a go to book for me.  However, it ended up being  probably one of the worst reads of the year-the main character literally has body dysmorphia and zaps herself everything from clear skin to a brand new rear.

I’ll be honest, I sot of felt bad for hating the book so much.  I know, I know, why would I feel guilt?  I rip into things all the time and you’d think it would almost be second nature to me.

Yeah, it is.  But I really hate doing it to new authors.  Which was one of the reasons I decided to give Geragotelis a second chance, besides the fact this book was looking all evily at me in the library like MJ, I dare you to read me.

And I went to law school.  So, that should obviously tell you I’m glutton for punishment.  

So, I read it.

And I can’t blame shitty Brooklyn (the M.C. in What the Spell) for why I didn’t like Geragotelis novel.  I just don’t like Geragotelis writing in general.

Which is sad considering I think nineteen million people liked her stuff on Wattpad.

Wattpad is a site I’ve always had issues with.  In theory it should be a good thing, I should like it.  It’s showcasing writers who otherwise wouldn’t have gotten a publishing contract, like Geragotelis.  But (and this is a huge but) I feel like the books that get picked up in that site lack quality.

Like Life’s a Witch which was actually written before What the Spell.  Which sort of amazes me because the book is slightly better.

Though, after some thought maybe Brooklyn was written so awful so Hadley-not Hedy- would appear to be less of a sociopath than she was.  Hey, that takes some skill, writing a worst character than Hedy.

I’m just trying to be positive here. You have to do that with a bad book.

Really though Hedy was a piece of work.  There were some quotes of hers that were, well, made Zoey Redbird look like MENSA material.

Per Example:

“This was the cool crowd.  And I was its queen.” (pg 15)

Really, who says that about themselves?  I ask you this would you want to be friends with someone who was that obsessed with themselves?

Sometimes a self involved main character is okay though.  Case in point, Mimi Force from The Blue Bloods series ended up going from gruesome bitch to the saving grace of that  series.  Because, she grew as a character.  Hedly, however, doesn’t seem to have the remotest chance of growing up.  For example, after a rather traumatic event (her mom and the rest of the parents in her coven or whatever it’s called) instead of taking charge and planning on how to defeat the big bad Hedy is doing this:

“To put it bluntly: he was beautiful.

 

And not just in an easy-on-the-eyes sort of way. But in an international-male-model kind of way. His hair was so black it was almost blue, and it spiked up in the middle with just a hint of bad boy to its tips.” (pg. 135)

Really, I get your a teenager and you have hormones.  But do you have to talk about a guy’s hair in the middle of a crisis?  And how the heck can hair make you a bad boy?  If New Adult has taught us anything, it’s body art that makes a bad boy bad.

Jesus, Geragotelis, get with the program.

If thinking about some guy’s hair being hot, doesn’t annoy enough about Hedy’s crisis skills.  Maybe her crisis management skills will.  After one of the kids-I honestly forgot most of their names because by this point I was just skimming and looking at the page numbers waiting to get done-asks her about their dead parents, Hedy says that they’re okay.

They’re dead.

The parents are dead.  But she acts like one of those psychics who goes on Montel and lies about someone’s missing relative and later gets admonished by CNN’s reigning badass, Anderson Cooper.

Seriously, we need Anderson to give her the stink eye in this book.

But nope, everyone and their mother seems to love Hedy and gets her free coffee and wants to get manis and pedis with her.

She really has no problem in her life, save for those pesky missing parents.  And who cares about them when you’ve got boys!

The love interest in this book is the same damn one in What the Spell, so people who experienced Brooklyn/Asher love  are going to be a little up and arms.

To be honest, the fact that the same love interest is in this one scares me since I know that the third (yes, there is another one of these damn things coming out) is going to be about Brooklyn and Hedy fighting over the boy toy.

This is seriously the sort of shit I don’t want to read.

But nineteen million people do.

I really have to wonder about the people who frequent Wattpad.  I know I’m not one to talk.  I frequented fanfiction.net growing up and there were some stories on there that would be raising the eyebrows, hello Master of the Universe (cough, Fifty Shades of Puke, cough), but I just cannot believe that this had nineteen million readers.  

However, apparently this sort of filth having fans galore isn’t a common occurrence on Wattpad.  I really don’t know how to explain this phenomenon or why my library always advertises these books.  There’s nothing redeemable about them plot wise or character wise.  There’s not even a redeeming moral lesson that I can get out of these books except if you have magic and want new boobs zap them on they’re all yours.