Lady Smits Reviews Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

In the small, Southern town of Gatlin, South Carolina there is not much to do, according to teenage protagonist Ethan Wate. His whole world changes when Lena Duchannes moves to town to stay with her reclusive, albeit infamous, Uncle Macon. Lena belongs to a family of Casters which is like witches and wizards. Caster legend dictates that each Caster is either light (good) or dark (evil), and it is not an allegiance one gets to choose of their own free will. The moon decides whether one is light or dark on the Caster’s sixteenth birthday. Lena is fifteen years old and has both light and dark in her family. Therefore she is obsessed with what her fate will be according to the sixteenth moon.

Ethan is drawn to Lena and her family, partly due to dreams he had of her before they ever met, despite warnings he receives about the dangers of a mortal being with a Caster as well as the fact that Lena and her family is considered to be the weird and trashy family in town. What follows is a love story of Ethan supporting Lena through the issues she faces with her family (light and dark want her for their own), townspeople (they think she is dangerous and want her out of school), and her own feelings and emotions (about being a Caster as well as normal adolescent first-love conflictions). Compounded with the fact that Ethan and Lena can communicate telepathically as well as a dangerous curse that makes this first book in the Beautiful Creatures series intriguing and entertaining.

Kirkus Reviews calls Beautiful Creatures a “smart, textured and romantic Southern Gothic,” and compares the writing style of Garcia and Stohl to that of John Green. The story is told from the point of view of Ethan. I found this interesting because the two authors are adult women writing from the perspective of a love-struck teenage boy. Students who are studying writing style and voice could use this book for comparison to other young-adult tales in which the gender of the author is the same as the main character, or to an author whose voice is similar such as John Green.

I think the story is appropriate for high school aged students because they would be most likely to relate to some of the situations the main characters and their friends face, except for the magic. There are some instances of mild language as well as suggestive language and innuendo. Lena and Ethan behave as most teenage couples and “make-out,” and they lie in each other’s beds, but actual sex is not mentioned. Lena’s cousin is the most evocative of all the characters since she is a Siren, but in this book she is a supporting character, not making her appearance until well into the story. Publishers Weekly thinks that Beautiful Creatures will appeal to those who enjoy “angst-filled teenage romance,” and who better enjoys those stories than those going through it themselves? The publication also mentions the mythology involved in the story, which could start a discussion comparing the world and mythic images of Casters in Gatlin to classic mythology creatures and gods.

 

Garcia, Kami, Margaret Stohl. Beautiful Creatures. New York: Little, Brown, 2009. Print.

“Beautiful Creatures.” Publishers Weekly 256.46 (2009): 55.

“Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl.” Kirkus Reviews, 20 May 2010. Web. 9
Sept. 2014. <http://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/kami-garcia/beautiful-creatures/>.

 

 

For further information and entertainment:

Kami Garcia’s Website and Blog

Margaret Stohl’s Website and Blog

Read the book, then watch the movie!

Other books in the series:

 

The story continues with Ethan’s best friend, Link, and Lena’s cousin, Ridley

 

 

 

 

Beautiful Creatures short stories, available only as e-books

 

 

 

 

I’m glad I’ve had the opportunity to share one of my favorite YA book series.

~ Lady Smits