Book Review: "Evermore" by Alyson Noel

After a horrible accident claims the lives of her family, sixteen-year-old Ever Bloom can see people's auras, hear their thoughts, and know someone's entire life story by touching them.  Going out of her way to avoid human contact and suppress her abilities, she has been branded a freak at her new high school- but everything changes when she meets Damen Auguste.

Damen is gorgeous, exotic, and wealthy.  He's the only one who can silence the noise and random energy in her head- wielding a magic so intense, it's as though he can peer straight into her soul.  As Ever is drawn deeper into his enticing world of secrets and mystery, she's left with more questions than answers.  And she has no idea just who he really is- or what he is.  The only thing she knows to be true is that she's falling deeply and helplessly in love with him.

My Review:

As you know, recently I have taken somewhat of a liking to these types of YA books.... paranormal, romance (hard word to get out for a guy!), fantasy... whatever you want to call them, I am a fan.  What I have noticed as far as a pattern is that there seems to always be some girl who falls madly in love with the super dude who seems to be cooler than anyone I have ever met.  Now that I got that out of the way, I think what I look for when I am reading these types of stories is a different angle....  something cool to go along with the "love struck" chick.  

Evermore had that angle that I was looking for.  I was totally waiting for a vampire to pop up.... didn't happen, which was sort of cool in it's own way.  Here's the deal with Ever.  Her family tumbles off the road in their car after a deer runs in front of their car (silly deer.. or was it???).  Throughout the book, Ever does blame herself for the accident as it was her who made her dad turn around to go home because she forgot her favorite sweatshirt.  Ever, her mom and dad, her sister Riley, and their little pet are all going to the place you go when your time has expired.  For some reason (and yes, I know the reason but I just would not be me if I told you that!) Ever makes it about halfway and then comes back... back to life.  

With her family dead, she moves in with her aunt who is a single working woman and hardly around for Ever.  This works as Ever finds company in her little 12 year old sister who supposedly died, but seems to be visible to Ever (and a few other "special" people) visits her on a fairly normal basis.  I'll give you this... Riley, her little sister did start to "cross over" the bridge to the other side when the accident happened, but turned around at the last second and is kind of stuck in between well, here and there.

So, Ever meets this stud Damen in school who has this funny way of making tulips appear out of nowhere that he keeps giving to Ever throughout the book (it is irrelevant to you in this review, but significant once you find out how he makes them appear and what they symbolize).  He is perfect in every way.  I won't go into the details of describing him, just know that he is perfect.  He starts to follow Ever and hang out with her often.  They even skip school and have some awesome fun days and the thing is, it doesn't really bother Ever who just loves to be with him.  However, what does bother her is that it appears that Damen is flirting with a few other girls, one of them being Drina, who let's just say is an old girl in his life.  Throughout the book, she goes from liking Damen to hating him almost on a regular basis (even though she never stops loving him).  He is strange, the way he does things, knows things, and is very private about his life.  

So as to not give you the whole story here and sum it up, Damen is an immortal.  He has been around for about 600 years.  I contemplated telling you guys this part, but I see no harm as it really doesn't give anything that would spoil things away and will probably give you a better idea of the story line.... here goes... Damen and Drina are both immortals (which does NOT mean that they can not die.. weird, I know but just work with me here) who have sort of been "together" for some of the 600 years.  Damen is done with her, but she is and has been obsessed with him and has been following him throughout the years trying to get his love that he once had for her back.  As a matter of fact, I almost think that she believes that he still does love her.  So where does Ever fit into the picture?  Ok, here's the part I really contemplated telling you or not, but again no big spoiler... Over the 600 years, Ever has come back as many different women.  She dies (but how?), comes back as someone else and this goes on until the present.  What she finds out is that Damen has loved her for the whole 600 years, finding her every time she dies and tries to profess his love for her each time.  If you are smart, you might start to see some connection and figure out how and why she dies each time.

In the mean time, since Ever had turned around from going over "the bridge" towards you know what, she has the ability to know what everyone is thinking around her all the time.  It bothers her as she really doesn't know how to control it and does not want this ability ALL the time.  She kind of keeps to herself with the exception of her 2 best friends.  One a female, and the other a guy who is let's say, very feminine.  They do playa HUGE role in the book, but this is a review, not a summary :o)

Anyway, to cut to the chase here, a few things are going on.  Ever needs to decide whether or not she wants to be with Damen, (which by the way is a decision that could last for quite some time once it is made), figure out why Drina is messing with all of her friends, and figure out what to do with her "gift" of being able to read people the way she does.  

The book did keep me engaged.  I enjoyed Damen's slick, yet passive ways about him.  I hated Drina who just kept showing up and wanting to hurt people.  I loved the relationship between Ever and her sis Riley, who for a 12 year old was a little wise guy.  I also loved the struggle that Ever faced throughout the entire book.  She felt responsible for her family's death, hated having her "abilities", had Mr. perfect, but couldn't really seal the deal with him for some reason (and yes, you will find out the reason and whether or not she seals the deal in the book), had friends who were just weird, had to figure out and deal with Drina, and always just seemed to need a xanax (which in the absence of, Ever seems to take a brief liking to vodka.  There is a very good reason for this... besides Damen, Vodka also temporarily fades her ability to read people's thoughts!)

At the end of the book (don't worry, i'm not gonna give it away) Ever makes a decision that could change her life forever (get it, forever??? No, you don't get it since you haven't read it yet).  ACtually she makes a few decisions... who to say goodbye to forever, who to keep around forever, and who to get rid of forever.  You might think you know who I mean, but I assure you, you don't. Overall, a pretty good book.  Obviously I would not have reviewed it if not :o)

What's cool is there are 3 books that are in the series so far (not sure if there are any more coming out, I didn't do my homework this time... sorry guys) and I bought all 3, so it was good enough that I plan to finish the series.  You all should know my rule by now, no 2 books in a series ever get read or reviewed back to back, so book 2 "Blue Moon" will be around the site sometime at a later date.

I would say that if you like these types of books, this one will be a winner for you.  Very well written and it does have that bit of difference to it that makes it interesting.  Again, there is MUCH more to the story that I left out, but I kind of always write my reviews that way.  Give you guys enough that I think will intrigue you to get the book, but not anywhere enough that you should feel like you just read the book!

Enjoy!

Dave