Review: Ethereal (Celestra, #1)

Cynthia Ayala ’16 / Emertainment Monthly Staff

Author: Addison Moore

Published: April 27, 2011

Publisher: Addison Moore | Smashwords

Series: Celestra Series

Genre: Teen Fiction, Paranormal, Romance

When her newly remarried mother moves the family to Paragon Island to a house rumored to be haunted, Skyla finds refuge in Logan Oliver, a boy who shares her unique ability to read minds.  Skyla discovers Logan holds the answers to the questions she’s been looking for: that Skyla’s blood may be connected to the most powerful angelic beings that roam the earth.  But that knowledge comes with a price, as suddenly an entire faction of earthbound angels wants her dead.

The angelic theme has been on the rise in young adult fiction and this book joins the group…but not very well done.

The biggest problem with this novel was the characterization. The main character Skyla was the most awful protagonist.  The author failed in her attempt to create a Mary Sue character. I at least could tolerate the character if she were a decent character, but she wasn’t.  The character was an incredible and selfish brat, not to mention rude and obnoxious.  I hated her.  The character gave off the impression that her parents were horrible, that her family was horrible when in fact they were like any other average family; nothing warranted her attitude towards them.  Then there were her moral standards.  She acted as though she was this all high and mighty character, repeatedly saying she was a virgin when she cheated on her creep of a boyfriend with his cousin.

Which brings me to the other worst character in the novel, her boyfriend Jason.  He is the biggest creep, dating her but then going to great lengths to get what he wants from this other girl, knowing how it would make her feel.  The pair of them were the worst characters in the book.  Her best friend was all right: a good personality even if she was a bit of a slut with bad ideas; she was still a good friend who cared about Skyla.  But everyone else was much like that, a little likable despite their faults.  Moore does know how to make her characters seem more human though– except the two main characters.

Now as far as the plotline goes, it wasn’t terrible and written better than the characters were.  However, it didn’t flow.  Some of the scenes were missing specifics like detail and dialogue attribution that would have made reading easier than it was.  There were just some scenes where a lot was going on, but the writing came off as a jumbled mess.  None of it was tethered to specifics which would have made the reader able to latch on to the story.

It was a unique story at the end of it, even though there were many things the writer could have chosen to do and not to do to make the story better.  Moore created a faction of angels that builds a new realm for readers, even portraying some as awful angels, which is a nice twist to the angelic theme going around.  Still, those main characters are awful to read.  ★★ (C-)