Dead Beautiful

DEAD BEAUTIFUL

By:  Yvonne Woon

FIRST SENTENCE

“My parents died on a hot August evening.”

SUMMARY
from goodreads

On the morning of her sixteenth birthday, Renee Winters was still an ordinary girl.  She spent her summers at the beach, had the perfect best friend, and had just started dating the cutest guy at school.  No one she'd ever known had died.  But all that changes when she finds her parents dead in the Redwood Forest, in what appears to be a strange double murder.

After the funeral Renée’s wealthy grandfather sends her to Gottfried Academy, a remote and mysterious boarding school in Maine, where she finds herself studying subjects like Philosophy, Latin, and the “Crude Sciences.”

It’s there that she meets Dante Berlin, a handsome and elusive boy to whom she feels inexplicably drawn. As they grow closer, unexplainable things begin to happen, but Renée can’t stop herself from falling in love. It’s only when she discovers a dark tragedy in Gottfried’s past that she begins to wonder if the Academy is everything it seems.

Little does she know, Dante is the one hiding a dangerous secret, one that has him fearing for her life.

Dead Beautiful is both a compelling romance and thought-provoking read, bringing shocking new meaning to life, death, love, and the nature of the soul.

REVIEW

I like paranormal books as much as the next girl, but Dead Beautiful was a little too creepy for me.  The summary (and the title) give a hint of what is going on, but I wasn’t really prepared for just how much death would overwhelm the story.

Renee was a girl who would speak her mind.  I liked that about her, even though it sometimes got her into trouble.  She had a lot going on in her life and she was thrown into a crazy situation at Gottfried Academy.

What I wasn’t so thrilled about was the relationship between Renee and Dante.  These two went from nothing to something way too fast.  I like a relationship that moves slowly.  How can they go from not speaking to each other to dating just like that?  Give me a relationship that builds over time.

If you like fast moving relationships and a very dark story, Dead Beautiful may be for you.  It wasn’t, however, a book I enjoyed. 

RATING

3        Plot

3        Characters

3        Attention Grabbing

3        Girlie Meter

3        Ending

15      TOTAL

3        STARS