A bit juvenile, sometimes suspenseful and violent and terrifying, overall a creative story with a nicely twisted plot. Proves somewhat weak in forming depth in relationships—lacks believability throughout in this area—and relies too much on cultural clichés for character development.

However, the story moves addictively fast if you overlook the immature dialogue at the start, and it is a shocking little adventure—the first morsel for what will be a 4-part series. I’d like the first taste to be slightly more tempting, but it was decent. Like the fast food of the teenage vampire fantasy genre (which is relief to some, cos who wants to read 700+ pages of semi-depressing descriptiveness about these kids? No. Get to the action. I can say Ahdieh certainly doesn’t waste time waxing emo nonsense about the sparkle off her characters' skin). 

Oh, the setting of nineteenth century New Orleans was dope (even if the dialogue and terminology didn’t always adhere to the norms of culture and context).