Book Review: Fallen

TITLE: Fallen
Book 1 in the Fallen series
AUTHOR: Lauren Kate
PUBLISHED: 2009
CATEGORY: Young adult
GENRE: angels, romance, drama, urban fantasy
PREMISE: Luce gets sent to a detention center where she meets Daniel who she feels inexpicably in love with.
MY REVIEW: Ask people about Fallen and you'll likely get three reactions. First is the uberfangirl love. They think it's utterly amazing yadda yadda. Please ignore this. This book is far from amazing. The other two reactions will be utter hatred but with different reasons for the hatred. Most Twihards will tell you this is a Twilight rip-off and it doesn't compare to their beloved series, most anti-Twilighters will tell you it's a Twilight rip-off that's just as bad. Also please ignore this because it's biased and unfair on both parties. I do not deny it's sort of a Twilight rip-off, but it's no where near as horrible as that dreck.
Honestly this book is what I call mediocre cheese. I am ashamed to admit I found parts of it enjoyable. Mostly the side characters though. Luce was almost as annoying as Bella Swan with her obsession over Daniel. She is perhaps a tad more self aware so I could at least tolerate her but nevertheless she is a Mary Sue, as is Daniel. Seriously, why was I supposed to root for these two? I saw no reason whatsoever for their attraction. They meet and wham!we're in love. No, my enjoyment came from slightly funny lines, the awesomeness that were Gabbe and Arriane and Penn (I hate what the author did there), and that at the very least it wasn't a complete waste of my time because when the book didn't deal with the romance and melodrama there were some intriguing ideas going on in here (even though once again, angel stuff is all wrong). I liked the suspense part. Unlike Meyer, this author is competant and manages to invite interest and doesn't spoil her own endings with unsubtle forshadowing.
So here's my dilemma. I do think it is a mediocre book but I enjoyed it despite the mediocreness? If that makes sense. You know how there are Twihards that say they enjoy Twilight despite how bad it is? Well...I guess you could say this series will be my Twilight. Only I'm not going to defend it to the death because it is mediocre (particularly the writing, GOD those prose...). My advice is check this out from the library and make your own conclusions. Oh, and I actually think this book is Twilight combined with Vampire Diaries and mixed in with The Immortals series so the Twilight rip-off isn't particularly accurate.
WHO SHOULD READ: Twilight fans (who don't think it's the best book in the world), angel fans (with low expectations)
MY RATING: Two and a half out of Five angel wings (that half star is for the pretty cover)