*Originally reviewed on Pages Of Forbidden Love

I had a bit of a rough start with Kaleidoscope. If you take a look at my favorite quotes you can see the first page or two really grabbed my attention but not soon after I was getting worried about how I would feel about this book. I honestly can’t tell you what it was about the beginning that had me feeling this way. There wasn’t anything that stuck out that had me going, “ugh! I must put this books down.” I think the thing was that it feels like it was not that long ago that I read a book covering the same subject. Although, I read many books that can be quite similar I still need some big difference to grab my attention and pull me in. At first Kaleidoscope wasn’t giving that to me. It felt like something I had already read before but since I had liked it before I marched on in search of something exciting to cling to. Fortunately for me I fell into a groove as things progressed and eventually couldn’t wait to finish the book.

I felt like the farther I got the more things were happening demanding my attention. I found myself picking things apart early on and piecing things together before they were revealed. It is funny. I hate secrets so much in real life but give me a good book/movie/tv show to entertain me and their better be some juicy secrets. Calliope has definitely had some secrets kept from her and with the first one revealed she slowly starts discovering even more nerve racking ones along the way. What I liked most about Calliope and these secrets though was her reaction. I felt most of the reactions were realistic and believable. There was some major freaking out before acceptance was found.

It takes more than some good reactions to like a character though. Did I like Calliope? I didn’t dislike her…okay for the most part I thought she was a good character but I am still making up my mind about a couple characters. I liked how normal Calliope was (even though she wasn’t really normal). She was just a girl dealing with the same feelings any other girl would have before throwing a life changing bomb into the mix. She had good friends, loving parents, and two sexy guys trying to help her through her new discovery. She is a loyal person who cares about the people close to her. Why wouldn’t I love her? I’m waiting to see how she is going to deal with some of the newest problems in her life before making a final decision. One problem in particular are the men in her life. I smell a love triangle… or would it be square…somewhere in the future and I am not sure how I feel about that.

I really appreciated how Mindy Hayes kept Calliope’s family as a big part of the story. They were mentioned often and actually around. Parent’s are often forgotten it seems like and although that doesn’t always bother me it is always a nice touch to have them included. It was one of my favorite things about Kaleidoscope. Besides Kai…I really liked him. Never one to stop the teasing and taunting. Of course he was hard not to love. He was one of the things that kept me intrigued in what I was reading. Mindy has me wanting to know more about these characters. I am ready to dig deeper and see what is in store for them next.

3.5 Hearts