Starcrossed by Josephine Angelini: Book review

Book title/Author: Starcrossed by Josephine Angelini

Publisher/Year: June 2011 Macmillan Children's

Genre: YA Fantasy

Series: Starcrossed #1

Pages: 518

Source/Format: Paperback | Bought with my own money

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

*This review may contain spoilers!*

Synopsis

Destiny brought them together.

The gods will keep them apart.

When shy, awkward Helen Hamilton meets Lucas Delos for the first time, she thinks two things: the first, that he is the most ridiculously beautiful boy she has seen in her life; the second, that she wants to kill him with her bare hands.

An ancient curse means Lucas and Helen are destined to loathe one another. But sometimes love is stronger than hate, and not even the gods themselves can prevent what will happen next...

My review

I really enjoy Greek mythology, despite not having read a lot of it. This book was a modern twist on a classic tale, and while I didn't love it, it was enjoyable. The story of Helen and Paris is well-known, but I like how Josephine made it her own by making the characters descendants of the Greek gods, giving them cool powers, and the whole bit where everyone looks like someone in that story.

As I mentioned before, the thing I may have enjoyed the most from this book were the powers that each character had. They were quite standard, but still incredible; like flying, being invincible,etc. 

I'm sad to say that I didn't really like either Helen nor Lucas that much. They were alright as main characters but I didn't connect with them. I couldn't find anything in common with either of them and that meant that I couldn't enjoy the book as much as I could have.

I was pleasantly surprised to find out how close the Delos family was; they were always together in the house and they supported one another, which leads me on to talk about how despite not liking the two main characters, I did enjoy most of the secondary characters. I liked some more than others, obviously, but it wasn't a bad bunch at all.

There were some times when reading that I would actually scoff at the ridiculousness (I know), like whenever Helen mentioned her cramps that she got whenever she performed her powers around mortals. They were just stupid and I don't know why it was in the book.

I really disliked the twist at the ending: I thought it was predictable and unnecessary, and Hector's fate was too dramatic for my liking.

To be honest, I'm not sure whether I'm going to continue with this series or not. But, if you enjoy Greek mythology, you might want to pick this up and see if you like the modernisation.

Izzy