The Summoning (Darkest Powers #1)

Chloe is a typical teen. Her mother died when she was young and her father is always absent. When she is fifteen, she sees a ghost at her school and is sent to a group home for teens with mental problems. There she learns the secret of her powers and is introduced to the dangers of having her abilities. With a home of teens with some suspicious problems, Chloe must figure out what is going on.

Warning: the following contains spoilers and is slightly PG-13. It's possible I could offend someone, I'm just saying.

First of all, I'd like to say that I did like this book and it was a fast read. The following will not convey that message at all but I did. Everyone else liked this book and had no complaints.

However, I call bullshit. The ending was ri-dic-u-lous. Yes, it was slightly shocking when her aunt turns in her in but not really. I'm also getting tired of "cliffhanger" endings. It seems everyone is doing that these days. Also who didn't figure out that everyone there was going to have powers of some kind and that the adults knew about the teens? If you didn't then you've never read this kind of book before. In fact it was pretty formulaic. Even Derek turning into a werewolf, I mean please. When he started having a fever, I was like Does he have a fever of a hundred and werewolf (shoutout) or what? and he did. I saw that coming before that anyway since his muscles were involuntarily rippling and he had "extra" abilities. I am a little suspicious of Simon and Rae. Someone there is up to no good, mark it.

I will admit that parts of it did give me the shivers especially when she is locked in that crawlspace. That just creeped me out although it did give me a Sabriel flashback so whatever. The real problem is the whole I have powers! no I don't! thing that Chloe goes through. It's in every freaking fantasy book now. Find. something. new. In fact, it reminded me of the Maximum Ride series crossed with the Old Kingdom series with a little Twilight for good measure. At least it wasn't about fairies.

See I told you it would sound like I didn't like it. Let me say something positive about it. It was well written and I liked Chloe. She was very feisty and it was cute how she tried to frame everything like it was movie. I don't trust the character Simon for some reason like I said but I liked Derek. He was a nice change from the normal flawless beautiful hero. The world building could use some work but then it is a series so there is time for that. I'm probably read the next one, but it's not on the top of my list or anything.