Book Review: Paranormalcy by Kiersten White

Title: Paranormalcy
Author: Kiersten White

Series: Paranormalcy #1

Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: August 31 2010

My Source: Borrowed from a friend

My Rating: 4.5/5

Goodreads Summary:

Weird as it is working for the International Paranormal Containment Agency, Evie's always thought of herself as normal. Sure, her best friend is a mermaid, her ex-boyfriend is a faerie, she’s falling for a shape-shifter, and she’s the only person who can see through paranormals' glamours, but still. Normal.

Only now paranormals are dying, and Evie's dreams are filled with haunting voices and mysterious prophecies. She soon realizes that there may be a link between her abilities and the sudden rash of deaths. Not only that, but she may very well be at the center of a dark faerie prophecy promising destruction to all paranormal creatures.

So much for normal.


My Review:

There's so many amazing things I could say about this book, that I don't even know where to begin! If this review doesn't make this book sound interesting to you, read it anyway, because there's a whole lot of great stuff I don't even have room to mention!

The world of Paranormalcy is much like our own, except all paranormal creatures exist, they just hide themselves under "glamours". I've seen this before, but that didn't stop this book from having it's own unique twist. Evie is the only one who can see through glamours. So the IPCA- International Paranormal Containment Agency- puts her to work. The agency was such an interesting idea! It was basically a government agency that regulated paranormals, and "neutralized" them so they couldn't attack. Hilarious, but at the same time, it was a bit corrupt, as we see later, and played a key and interesting part in the plot.

Evie is a really entertaining character. Unlike other girl heroines in books I've read recently, she's girly, but she's also not afraid to kick butt. Her taser is pink with sparkles. That pretty much sums up her personality. She's such a real girl too, and she is so much fun to read about. It never gets boring. I liked Evie a lot and I could really relate to her too.

The romance isn't the whole focus of the book, but I really loved it. It wasn't one of those situations where an ordinary girl meets a "to die for" guy and they fall madly and passionately in love. Those are okay and they have their place, but this book wasn't like that. On the other hand, it wasn't like a lot of other books I've been reading recently, where the guy and girl are best friends for a long time and they eventually realize they're really in love. (Once again, that's great, but it's nice to see something different.) In Paranormalcy, Evie meets a teenage guy, and eventually they fell in love, but the romance between them was so cute and naive. It was exactly what I'd love to have in a romance if I were Evie. Neither of them had been in love before, and it's like they were growing up together, learning what it meant to love somebody together. It was so adorable and innocent and I really loved it. Not to mention he was a super cool guy character too. The relationship was great and it made me squeal a few time, no lie. :)

The actual conflict seemed like a background to the fantastic characters. Evie finds out there's a fairy prophecy about her, and a lot of paranormal creatures are dying and no one knows why. I actually thought the plot was the only drawback to this book, because even though I liked it, I thought it was a bit confusing and more time could've been spent explaining it. We still had no clue what was going on through most of the book. That's why it felt like it was only in the background. I hate to say it, but the conflict wasn't exactly were epic either. No huge ordeals or anything. I'm not saying that this book would've been better if there had been. It wouldn't have. This book was meant to be a light, fun story even though it had some dark creatures. It was great the way it was. I think that the plot was why it only got a 4.5 rating from me. I considered giving this book a 5 rating, but that's rare, and I believe a book should be a bit more "epic" and have more plot twists to become one of my true favorites.

I still loved Paranormalcy, though! If the previous explanation is in any way confusing (as I know it might be), just ignore it.

I also wanted to point out how clean this book was. No cussing, or adult content, yet still an amazing book. It's nice to find books like this. Sometimes they're hard to come by sometimes even in the young adult market.

Paranormalcy is a one-of-a-kind book, full of magic and intrigue, with a brilliant heroine and perfectly adorable romance. I can't wait for the next book to come out. Paranormalcy has a great cover too. What a fantastic debut!