Pub date: January 31, 2011.Starting over is nothing new to diplomat’s daughter Lindsey Yi. She’s grown up changing schools the way other girls change clothes. Still, moving to Lincoln, Connecticut, is different. Although she’s still reeling from the loss of her parents in an accident, Lindsey is finally in a place that feels like home. Because here, Lindsey’s ability to read other people’s thoughts doesn’t make her weird. It makes her one of the Mystyx.
When Dylan Murphy—hot, popular and a senior—starts to notice her, things get serious, fast. But even as she’s figuring out how she really feels, the Mystyx realize that they’re not the only supernaturals in town. There are other gifted teens who have different motives. And they are hoping to get close enough to the Mystyx to convert them—and the world—to Darkness… (netgalley.com)
First off, the cover looks like a white girl with cat eye make-up, not a Korean chick that, as far as I could tell wasn't a mixed race Korean but full-blooded. And considering how often she referred to her heritage in the book, and how often racial slurs were thrown her way, I'm guessing she looked a lot more Asian than this. But maybe the copy I'm seeing is just off . . .
I have to say, I'm kinda glad this story arc is over because by this one, the circumstances were getting downright silly. And a running theme through all of them was how easily the darkness was defeated. MESMERIZE was no exception so I can't really fault it for that since at least the series has been consistent. But I guess just the silliness of how it manifested just got to me and I really couldn't take it seriously anymore. With the big clawed creatures stomping about, I kept picturing something out of an old He-Man cartoon as opposed to something more tangible than ink.
Lindsey's story had the potential to be really great. Here's a girl that's trying to get over the death of her parents and in the midst of that healing she needs to tangle with some dark stuff too. It could have been an epic parallel that would have ridden the plot nicely. But holy shit does Lindsey get fucking dumb when Dylan enters the picture. I've been saying lately that sometimes one needs to get whacked in the face with a branch in order to see the forest for the trees. In Lindsey's case, she needed to get gang raped by a forest of sequoias to get that far. I mean dumb to the point where I wanted to throw my reader. In this case it would have been my computer screen. At work. That would have been disastrous on may levels.
As far as anything concerned Dylan, he could do no wrong. Except he was set up to be something major right from the beginning. Not to mention he was really controlling, which she was okay with. And even when the big reveal was made, Lindsey still had a hard time swallowing the water being thrown on her face. Even in the middle of the THIS IS ME moment, she's still like "okay, maybe there's a possibility . . ." Yeah, and there a possibility that Dina Lohan is a bad parent.
Lindsey's level of stupidity and her blatant disregard for the obvious was so overwhelming that I really couldn't pay attention to much else. There was a great stand together moment at the end where the Mystyx joined forces to defeat Charon and his darkness brigade but since Lindsey was lobotomized up until the last possible second, it really didn't bare much weight for me. Especially when the rest of her friends were sitting there going HELLO?
The ending left it open for more books but at this point, I really couldn't figure out if I was still reading because I really wanted to or because I had some self-imposed obligation to keep reading the series. Considering how it ended, I'm going with the latter. If there are more books I'm probably going to pass on them. The series as a whole is two out of two for me. Krystal's and Jake's stories were by far the best, with Sasha having a less than stellar voice and Lindsey being a major moron. Add in the overall silliness of the villains and I'm going to call it a flush. It could really go either way at this point and while it's leading into Krystal's voice, which I like, the potential silliness is a turnoff. This'll probably end up being one of those series where if I have the time I may finish it but right now I think I'm good.
Ban Factor: High - Like with its predecessors, with Greek gods and low levels of Christianity, it's bound to rile up them Bible thumpers.
