Unleashed by Nancy Holder & Debbie Viguié

Unleashed by Nancy Holder & Debbie Viguié
Delacorte Books, 304 pages
ARC courtesy of Random Buzzers

"Katelyn McBride’s life changed in an instant when her mother died. Uprooted from her California home, Katelyn was shipped to the middle of nowhere, Arkansas, to her only living relative, her grandfather. And now she has to start over in Wolf Springs, a tiny village in the Ozark Mountains. Like any small town, Wolf Springs has secrets. But the secrets hidden here are more sinister than Katelyn could ever imagine. It’s a town with a history that reaches back centuries, spans continents, and conceals terrifying truths. And Katelyn McBride is about to change everything. Broken families, ageless grudges, forced alliances, and love that blooms in the darkest night—welcome to Wolf Springs. Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguié, the New York Times bestselling authors of the Wicked series, have created an entirely new trilogy with the passion of Twilight and the grandeur of Fallen. The Wolf Springs Chronicles introduces readers to a town of secrets and the new girl who's about to start believing in werewolves."

I was very excited when I read the synopsis of Unleashed. It sounds roughly like something along the lines of Twilight meets Vampire Academy (two staples in the Young Adult genre). So, when my busy season started to die down and I had more time to read, I started devouring my monstrous pile of books hidden away in my closet (I really need to get a bookshelf!!). One day, when I was looking through my to-be-read pile, I came across Unleashed and I thought that it was long overdue for some attention!

I started the book and was instantly brought in with the action that occurs at the beginning. For those of you who like to be thrown into a storyline, this is definitely the book for you! Anyway, the beginning of the book goes into the usual: where the lead character, Katelyn, is at in her life and how she fell into the predicament she is now in. This book started out interesting enough, but as I continued, it became very boring and generic. I understand that the authors needed to set up a basis for Katelyn's life, but it really dragged through the first third of the book.

I ended up neglecting Unleashed (it sat in my school bag and on my desk for a spell) because I got busy again: the story of senior year!!

Finally I said to myself, "I have to buckle down and finish this sucker." So, I started to read the book while teachers were talking about things that I could care less about and while I was supposed to be watching my sister's softball games (I know, I'm such a great sister! Not! But it was only one game!). Although the story took a while to get off the ground, the drama and intensity of the storyline started to burst out toward the last third of the book. I was excited that this book I was so interested in finally picked up.

The ending was honestly the best part (Not in a bad way!). The last seventy pages or so were the most thrilling part of the book. Katelyn's love triangle, however, was extremely frustrating for a person who is the queen of romance novels in The Readable Kingdom! She constantly gives the two guys, Trick and Justin, mixed signals!! It makes me so unbelievably irritated!!! But on the plus side, the romance scenes are pretty steamy. I was very pleasantly surprised. In a way, they kind of outweighed the boring beginning (I'm being serious).

All in all, this book was pretty good. My only complaints are that it took too long for the action to pick up and the love triangle thing is frustrating. For anyone who likes to read about werewolves and folklore like that, I would recommend this with caution. The werewolf action doesn't start until a little later in the book.

Rating: 3 stars - I liked it. Worth borrowing.