Book review: Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
Hush, Hush has been on my TBR pile a long time through no fault of its own. I’d tried to read Fallen by Lauren Kate and since it didn’t work for me, the premise of fallen angels fell off my radar for a while, pun intended. But I finally got back in the mood for the meme, and I pulled this down to give it a shot.
A couple things needs to be said about the main character, Nora Gray, and her best friend Vee. These are not the brightest girls in high school, and they have low senses of self-preservation. They make bad choices. They never have a good comeback when involved in cut down contests. Nora is a horrible liar, being almost entirely incapable of coming up with believable excuses. She’s working at the lower end of the educational bell curve.
Does this make this book bad? No.
To get the story started, Nora is swapped in Biology class from her friend Vee to “the guy at the back of the class,” a move which set off about a billion red flags for me. I early on came to the decision that either the author had never been in a real Biology class, or the teacher’s strange unprofessional behavior had to be the result of mind control. And it does come out later that mind control is a factor in the story. but, as it’s happening in the story, a lot of what’s going on reeks of WTF. But readers who stick around will soon learn it all relates to Patch, “the guy from the back of the class.”
What to say about Patch? In a word, he’s creepy. No, really, totally freaking creepy. And I’m an expert on creepy. I found myself comparing this book over and over to Twilight, and I feel like Patch is ten times creepier than Edward. The scenes that he and Nora get close make me feel ill and nervous, and it doesn’t come across as romantic, even if Nora says that she thinks Patch is hot. To me it feel like a stalker cornering a girl he doesn’t belong around. Since Patch has mind control in his list of powers, it’s hard not to think he could influence Nora to feel things that she isn’t really feeling. And maybe he isn’t, but it’s still really creepy considering what he does to Nora twice in the course of the story. (Don’t worry, no spoilers.)
That mind control aspect is important, because a lot of things happens in this book that wouldn’t make any sense without someone pulling Nora’s strings. It allows for some good explanations for the weird scenes without creating too many incongruities. Still it is a rather convenient plot device, and near the end, it gets over played a bit. Also without realizing something else is at work here, some folk might be turned off by the Biology teacher’s behavior.
But, does this make Hush, Hush a bad book? No.
Where the book begins to get confused is in adding all these other characters into the mix who are connected to Patch, and thus to Nora. But when the reason starts coming out for one angel who’s ALSO stalking Nora along with Patch and the real bad guy, it doesn’t make much sense. She’s hot for Patch, and she wants him to become a guardian angel and return to heaven. And yet, she also plots to sabotage him from saving his charge and ascending. So her motivations come across as a little confused.
When the bad guy reveals himself at last, his reasons for wanting to kill Nora at least make sense, but the bad guy is just like Patch, also having mind control abilities. So his final monologue both clears up some of the incongruities and makes a few more. I did think his story was tied up a little too conveniently, and after so much build up in the rest of the book, the ending was kind of a let down.
And that closing chapter with the “romantic” kiss…no. Some other readers might think that scene is hot, but like I said, Patch was really creepy to me. I just don’t know if after a guy confessed that he thought about killing me twice, I’d still seriously consider a life-long relationship with him. But maybe that’s me being selfish, wanting to live longer, and all.
Ultimately, the story isn’t bad, but it isn’t great. It’s the first in a series, and I admit I feel enough curiosity about these characters that I’ll look for Crescendo. Yes, I think Patch is creepy and not all that romantic, but I don’t need to love characters to find their stories interesting. And I think both Nora and Vee are cringingly, hopelessly stupid. But, that doesn’t mean they can’t carry a story on their poorly cracked jokes and even more poorly thought out social plans. Seriously, Vee lets herself be talked into breaking into a school thinking “it’ll be fun.” ZERO sense of self-preservation, really.
So, I give Hush, Hush 3 stars, and I recommend it to paranormal romance and YA fans looking for something on the topic of fallen angels. It’s not a great story, but it’s a fun summer read that covers its potential flaws with a decent plot device. I’ll look forward to the sequel to see what new threats await Patch and Nora.
