“Torment” Review (Fallen #2)

Cynthia Ayala ’16 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

By: Lauren Kate

Published: September 28, 2010

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Series: Fallen

Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal Romance

Lucinda Price turned upside down long before she went to Sword and Cross.  But then her life spiraled out of control when she discovered she had lived countless other lives, dying again and again when she kissed the love of her life, Daniel a fallen angel from Heaven.  But this is her last life, her last reincarnation, and there are those who seek to end it.  Left alone in a new school with other Nephiium, clueless about who is hunting her, she seeks out answers of her past life, answers that will tell her who exactly she is and why her life holds the fate of humanity in the balance.

The details in the novel were well done.  Kate was able to capture the facial expressions in the novels perfectly.  While the story is very character driven, it is also very detail-driven.  So much happens, especially near the end, but it flows brilliantly without skipping a beat.  You’re thrown into this novel and you are able to see everything: who everyone is, what they look like and where they are.  Everything is well-done and well-organized, expanding the overall plot line very well and making it an easy novel to follow. It has a clear beginning, middle, and end, and the character growth coincides with the plot and the psyche of the characters effortlessly.

As far as characterization goes, the characters were captured perfectly. There is absolutely no doubt about that, but the characters, specifically Luce and Daniel, became incredibly tedious and annoying.  Luce has become the oversensitive girl who takes everything far too seriously.  Given everything that happened in the last book and the fact that her life was almost cut-short, one would find her oversensitive attitude somewhat acceptable.  However, the story that progresses there is a point where it just becomes annoying, making her come off as needy and pathetic, something that goes against her original creation.  It is obvious that Kate intends this character to be strong, willful, and not the damsel-in-distress that everyone treats her as.  Even in the previous book she was not the oversensitive girl who came off as fragile.  That seems to have changed completely in this novel.  However, with her new friends in this novel, Shelby and Miles, she slowly stops being the annoying character you want to roll your eyes at.

Then there is Daniel.  It is incredibly annoying reading and watching these two interact with one another because they don’t say anything to one another.   The pair of them keep things bottled up until they explode, they kiss and make up, and then everything is fine and he flies away, expecting her to just listen to everything he says without explaining anything.  Daniel ships her off and explains nothing.  This is annoying because it takes away from the chemistry, from the love story that they are supposed to have with one another.  On the one hand, it does come off as a real honest relationship, but on the other hand, it just doesn’t feel like these two are supposed to be together at all which goes against the premise behind the novel.  Their love turned him into a fallen angel.

Despite this, Kate does do a wonderful job creating these characters and giving them real life personalities, even if some of them are annoying.  But in the end it grounds the novel in reality and Kate must be applauded for that.

★★★☆☆ (B-)