Cursed

Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout

Goodreads Rating: 4.15

My Rating: 3.75 Stars

Pages: 288

Reviewed by: Nicole

Dying sucks-- and high school senior Ember McWilliams knows firsthand. After a fatal car accident, her gifted little sister brought her back. Now anything Ember touches dies. And that, well, really blows.
Ember operates on a no-touch policy with all living things--including boys. When Hayden Cromwell shows up, quoting Oscar Wilde and claiming her curse is a gift, she thinks he's a crazed cutie. But when he tells her he can help control it, she's more than interested. There's just one catch: Ember has to trust Hayden's adopted father, a man she's sure has sinister reasons for collecting children whose abilities even weird her out.

However, she's willing to do anything to hold her sister's hand again. And hell, she'd also like to be able to kiss Hayden. Who wouldn't? But when Ember learns the accident that turned her into a freak may not have been an accident at all, she's not sure who to trust. Someone wanted her dead, and the closer she gets to the truth, the closer she is to losing not only her heart, but her life. For real this time.

I got this book from a friend after I missed getting my own copy at BEA12. The concept had sounded really cool to me and I was really excited to get to check it out. This was also my first Spencer Hill Pub book, and I have a friend that works there which made me doubly excited to check it out.

This book felt very familiar as I was reading, not because I had read it before, but killing people or plants when you touched them was a very Rogue thing to do. (Although I must admit ignorance as to Rogue's ability to suck the life force from plants and animals as Ember could do.) Even though it kicked up a lot of reminders, I still really enjoyed the book.

The beginning was a little hard to stick with, and in all honesty, I almost gave up on it. Nothing about Ember was really drawing me in. What also bugged me was learning about Hayden and just how much he was following her. Yeah, cute, the first few times, but then it came to a point where it was stalker-ish how much he knew about her family. I never entirely trusted him.

On that note, I felt like I also didn't connect with Hayden and Ember as a couple. Usually i find myself invested in the couple, rooting for them to make it work, but I couldn't do it with these two. There was just no love from me to them. I wish that it had been different for them. Ember was too much of an isolated loner. I understand that it was hard for her to connect with people after having died and been brought back, but she didn't put any effort into trying when she came to live with the Cromwell's. 

This book had a lot of cute scenes with Olivia, Ember's little sister, and between Hayden and Ember. I did love that he seemed to come to her rescue, even if it made her seem more powerless than she was. My favorite scene was after one of the earlier attempts on her life, Ember's paranoid side comes out as she continues to interrogate people while high on morphine.

I felt like there was a lot more to the story that could have been explored, and as far as I can tell Cursed is a stand alone.  It was funny and cute at times, but it did also have its dark side. Although it didn't have a great first impression, I did enjoy the ending which made it all worthwhile.