Book Review: Warped

TITLE: Warped
AUTHOR: Maurissa Guibord
PUBLISHED: 2011
CATEGORY: Young adult
GENRE: unicorns, mythology, fantasy, romance
PREMISE: Tessa's father purchases an unusual tapestry and case of books. After pulling a thread from the tapestry a young man appears in her bedroom...
MY REVIEW: I admit, so far the 2011 books have been kind of ho hum for me. The only ones I've been truly excited about are sequels to last years stuff (Red Glove, Overbite, The Gathering, Iron Queen, Clockwork Prince/City of Fallen Angels) or authors that I'm already fans of (super excited for Abandon by Meg Cabot). None of the new stuff has really thrilled me aside from maybe Unearthly but even Unearthly looks very similar to everything else that is out there. Lets face it, angel books are dime a dozen these days. So Warped was definitely a pleasant thrill for me that I wasn't expecting.
It's not a perfect book. The romance is a tad rushed (but still fun), and plot gets somewhat chaotic at times and writing is about average. But for a first book this is some good stuff. It helps that the author has imagination and is thinking outside the vampire/werewolf/angel/faerie love triangle box that most YA authors seem to be stuck in nowadays. It also really helps that this book has lots of things that make me giddy: unicorns, time travel, past lives, wyrd sisters (love those broads), snarky couple, a female who uses her brain and has personality, and an awesome sidekick (Opal was my favorite in this book, she had all the best lines). As an added bonus the plot was interesting, the characters interesting and fun, a great sense of humor too it (did I mention I love Opal?), and again: creativity.
Again, I admit, not totally perfect but definitely enjoyable and I look forward to more from this author. From the looks of the ending she's setting it up for a series and I really hope that happens because I want more. But I'd be up for just more of her books period and won't complain if she writes something else instead. This is definitely one of the better debuts this year.
WHO SHOULD READ: Team Unicorn folks, fantasy fans
MY RATING: Four out of Five tapestrys