Alyzon Whitestarr by Isobelle Carmody

Title: Alyzon Whitestarr
Author: Isobelle Carmody
Age Group: Teens
# of Pages: 501
My Rating: 1/5

Alyzon Whitestarr comes from an artistic family. She is the only one who does not have any sort of talent. Until she hits her head in an accident.

Waking up in a hospital, she discovers that all of her senses have been enhanced... tremendously. But the most particular thing of all is that her sense of smell has changed completely. Now she can read people's emotions by the "scent" they let off. For example, when her father is tensed and worried about something, he lets of an ammonia smell. But when he is happy, he has a caramelized sugar aroma wafting around him.

Alyzon learns to control her senses so they won't take a toll on her. But what happens when her old crush smells horribly revolting? And the smell never goes away? What kind of dark secret can he possibly be hiding? Alyzon realizes that some people are not what they seem. And using her new senses, she must do everything she can to protect herself and the people she loves from evil.

I am so, so, so disappointed with this novel by Isobelle Carmody. I requested it because the summary sounded good. And for me, that was about as good as it got.

Never have I read such a long and boring novel. Not only that, but Alyzon for some reason felt obliged to give a background explanation for everything. And I do mean everything. For example, when she was about to go to this town or whatnot, she took up like several pages explaining how she went there once. Do I care? No. Does it help the plot in anyway? No. Will I get the time I lost reading those pages? No.

All of the characters for some reason spoke the same way. It was so nerve-wracking! Every. Single. Character. They are all supposedly "deep". I guess in a way they were, in a philosophical sense. But I was so sick of the fact that everyone had the same thought process! It is not exciting to meet every person who is practically like yourself! Maybe if there was diversity, it could have been better.

I could not get through this novel. By the last 100 pages, I gave up completely and just skimmed through. So technically I don't know what happened in the end. I dreaded reading through out because the story took forever to build up. It had no direction in the beginning and by the middle, it just got weird. It was even worse for the fact that the book was so long!

Some suggestions on how it could have been better was that the author should have removed the excessive information, change the characters up a bit, and EXPLAIN how it was possible for Alyzon to receive her gift. I was so surprised how quickly everyone "accepted" her power after telling them about it. In real life, there would be someone who would look at you like you are crazy until proof was shown.

I don't recommend Alyzon Whitestarr in any shape or form.

Review copy provided by Book Divas.