Jenny Pox (The Paranormals, Book I)

Is this book young adult paranormal romance? Is it urban fantasy and horror? It's a bit of everything, and the fact that what you get here is so unexpected takes a little getting used to, but then ends up being refreshing and fun.

THE BLURB:

Eighteen-year-old Jenny Morton has a horrific secret: her touch spreads a deadly supernatural plague, the "Jenny pox." She lives by a single rule: Never touch anyone. A lifetime of avoiding any physical contact with others has made her isolated and painfully lonely in her small rural town.

Then she meets the one boy she can touch. Jenny feels herself falling for Seth...but if she's going to be with him, Jenny must learn to use the deadly pox inside her to confront his ruthless and manipulative girlfriend Ashleigh, who secretly wields the most dangerous power of all.

MY THOUGHTS:

Some pretty darn decent writing here, folks. I was hooked on the first half of this book, which reads like a young adult paranormal romance with an original twist. 

But then the unexpected began to happen.

First - a scene of an ensorceled threesome semi-rape, in which we are treated to descriptions of how one of the girls gags on...well, you know. 

Okay, not so much young adult anymore! Add to that the fact that the main characters smoke weed every now and again, and I can see how some parents wouldn't want their younger teens reading this. The pot didn't bother me - in fact, I found it kind of refreshing. By no means do all high school seniors partake, but some do, and so I thought it perfectly realistic for these characters to do so.

Second - the romance becomes a little less romantic now that we've involved pus dripping off of one lover's blistered tongue into the other's mouth, even if it's a means of saving him. And it's a little hard to see the character dispensing vigilante justice by causing popping blisters and flesh sloughing off of bones as a hero. BUT...once you are able to reconcile yourself to the grotesqueries, you do find yourself cheering on these characters with the admirable motives, regardless of their methods.

The end of Book I gives us a fascinating explanation behind these paranormal folk and their history, and so the story can easily continue to be fun, interesting, (and somewhat shocking) in the next installments of the series.

MY RATING:

4 booksies!

The Paranormals continues in Tommy Nightmare, Alexander Death, and Jenny Plague-Bringer.

Author's website: http://www.jlbryanbooks.com/home.html

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