This was not what I was expecting and I'm pretty ok with that.

We open with Reese, a high school debate champion mortified over blowing nationals, noticing dead birds on the ground at the Phoenix airport(which is called SkyHarbor International, just fyi)what happens next changes everything. I'm gonna nit pick a little and say that the descriptions of my home state were not terribly accurate and it did take me out of the narrative a bit. Not all of the Southwest is the same, or even similar, but moving on...

Malinda Lo's biggest strength is letting us inside the goings on in our protagonists head. Reese is by leaps and bounds the most well developed character and easy to relate to. The other cast of characters were not neglected but I wish that we got to see more of them. Having said that I absolutely want to commend Lo for creating a YA book where the parents are NOT 1) clueless or 2) criminally neglectful. It was pretty damn refreshing to see a healthy mother-daughter relationship in genre YA.

I hate love triangles. I truly do. Having said that I have to give props to a writer who can pull one off. At this point in the story (there is undoubtedly a sequel) I really feel like Reese could end up with either person and that's hard to accomplish with a love triangle. (Let's not play I know someone somewhere thinks Twilight pulled it off. It didn't. Everyone knew where that was headed, although admittedly the execution was pretty unexpected.)

There's also the matter of pacing. I have read reviews where people called this into question. I understand where they are coming from. This book doesn't have an ending. Truly it doesn't. It's the book version of To Be Continued. I'm ok with that but if you're not, probably wait to pick this up until the sequel is released, or at least officially announced.

To set the perfect mood, read this on a late summer night when you're all by your lonesome and enjoy.