Review: White Cat by Holly Black

Title: White Cat

Author: Holly Black

Rating:1/2

Who Should Read It? Everyone who has ever enjoyed a YA book. For serious! Especially those who enjoy male protagonists but find good ones hard to come by.

What I Have to Say:
I seriously ADORED this book. Unexpectedly adored this book. I'd read several reviews of it, and everyone said it was good, but after how I felt about "the Spiderwick Chronicles" (liked but certainly didn't love), I never felt over inspired to read it. Then a friend gave me a copy, and I was looking for something a little different, so I gave it a try.
And I am SO glad I did.
Cassel grows up a non-curse worker in a family of curse workers, and this has caused some resentment and some problems for him throughout his life. When he wakes up one morning to find that he has sleep-walked to the school roof after a dream in which a White Cat steals his tongue, his entire world changes.
Holly Black does an AMAZING job of subtly creating a world that is similar to ours but also completely different. The world she has created is fascinating. Curse workers work with their hands, so everyone wears gloves. The idea of being touched by bare hands actually repels some people. She slowly develops it throughout the book in such a way that you're dying for more, to know more, without ever realizing why.
Cassel's attempt at coming to terms with his past and allowing himself to live in the present, dealing with his manipulative brothers and his jailed mother.
White Cat was filled with twists and turns that will keep you wanting more until the very end. As the plot develops and Cassel learns more about his somewhat mysterious past, you'll find yourself rooting for him despite some of the horrible things he's done.
The only unfortunate thing about this book is that it doesn't keep you guessing. Some of the bigger plot points were extremely obvious very early on in the book. Luckily, this didn't really take away from anything. And I would recommend against reading the summary beforehand. It gives way too much away.
Definitely worth the read!

Summary:Cassel comes from a family of curse workers — people who have the power to change your emotions, your memories, your luck, by the slightest touch of their hands. And since curse work is illegal, they're all mobsters, or con artists. Except for Cassel. He hasn't got the magic touch, so he's an outsider, the straight kid in a crooked family. You just have to ignore one small detail — he killed his best friend, Lila, three years ago.

Ever since, Cassel has carefully built up a façade of normalcy, blending into the crowd. But his façade starts crumbling when he starts sleepwalking, propelled into the night by terrifying dreams about a white cat that wants to tell him something. He's noticing other disturbing things, too, including the strange behavior of his two brothers. They are keeping secrets from him, caught up in a mysterious plot. As Cassel begins to suspect he's part of a huge con game, he also wonders what really happened to Lila. Could she still be alive? To find that out, Cassel will have to out-con the conmen.

Holly Black has created a gripping tale of mobsters and dark magic where a single touch can bring love — or death — and your dreams might be more real than your memories.

Cover Story: I guess it's alright. It's got the right feel, even if I don't love the real person on the cover making it seem like a movie cover for the book. It's better than the original brown cover, though.

I CAN'T WAIT TO READ THE NEXT BOOK IN THIS SERIES!!!!