Meridian -- Amber Kizer

Meridian Sozu has always been unhealthy. Her color is bad, she's lived most of her life in pain, and she's much too small for her age.

And there are the dead things. They started small—dead flies collected in her crib, a toad died next to her bed—but as Meridian aged, the animals got bigger and their numbers grew. Her backyard is a cemetery.

The situation has not gone unnoticed by her peers, and so Meridian Sozu is an outcast. They call her "Reaper, Grave Digger, Witch".

Just after her sixteenth birthday she learned the truth. She is a Fenestra: a half-angel, half-human being whose purpose is to transition souls to the afterlife. Now that she is sixteen, she must learn to transition humans through, or she will die.

There are those who will help her, but there are those who do not want to see her survive.

Bloggers have been all over this one, it has strong reader reviews at Amazon, and I'm sure it'll be quite popular with the rapidly growing fanbase of romantic paranormal YA. And really, I wouldn't be surprised to see it get adapted into a television show.

Personally, though, overall, I thought it was... okay. I had a hard time believing in Meridian, because I didn't find her voice particularly believeable. The writing, overall, felt uneven—sometimes it was funny (if tv-ish):

"Don't tell me the 'go to the light' thing someone always says to dying people in movies is accurate." I was trapped in a Lifetime special.

but sometimes it was... well:

I packed everything I think you'll want. Please forgive me if I overlooked a beloved token of your childhood. I did my best. Your father sends his love.  Sam will miss you more than the rest of us combined, I fear. You are one of the Chosen, Meridian. For that I am both grateful and sorrowful.

Beloved token; I fear; grateful and sorrowful. I have a difficult time imagining anyone actually using that language in this century. 

I had a hard accepting the idea that her parents knew what she was but withheld that knowledge, even though they knew she was miserable and hurting. I understand denial, but that was too much for me to believe—that they moved around the country to avoid trouble, but they treated her somewhat crappily and didn't prepare her for the future, all because they wanted her to have a "normal childhood". 

And Meridian was unfortunately one of those smart-but-dense types. I spotted the villain immediately, and while it didn't take her all that long to catch up, it still took her too long. For that matter, Auntie or Tens should have picked up on it ages before Meridian even came to town.

I did like how the villain used religion to gain followers. Unlike the first few House of Night books, the book didn't feel offensively anti-Christian. There was a sense of history that made me imagine the Aternocti using the same methods for centuries—but the Big Bad ended up being so two-dimensional that he wasn't even remotely frightening. When someone evil is trying to convince you to join his side, it seems like he'd use an argument a tad stronger than, "We're the winning team". Especially after he'd been portrayed as so silver-tongued that he'd easily convinced an entire town to follow his Evil Lead.

Part of my problem was certainly my own—due to chatter in the blogosphere, I expected something different. Loads of people have been saying that this book is NEW and DIFFERENT, but I didn't see it that way. I've seen Buffy. Many times through. And I've read a lot—A LOT—of books. I'm very familiar with the Girl-With-A-Responsibility-To-The-World-Who-Doesn't-Really-Want-The-Responsibility-To-The-World-Because-Guess-What-She's-Sixteen storyline. And then (kind of hilariously, but in a good way) right at the very end, Meridian morphed from Buffy into Supernatural. (Which actually made me decide that, despite my reservations, I'll probably pick the next one out when it's released. Lesson here? Familiarity can go either way, depending on the whim of the reader.) While I can't hold my expectations against the book, I can't say that they didn't color my reading of it.

So. As I said. I can't imagine that this one won't be popular with many of the Usual Suspects, as long as the issues mentioned don't drive them bananas.

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I read this book for the R.I.P. IV challenge.

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Book source:  Review copy from the publisher.