Halo by Alexandra Adornetto - Revision history

Sue at 12:52, 1 September 2020

2020-09-01T12:52:04Z

Jill at 16:52, 9 April 2018

2018-04-09T16:52:43Z

Sue at 21:13, 6 February 2018

2018-02-06T21:13:34Z

Sue at 10:49, 29 November 2014

2014-11-29T10:49:31Z

Sue at 14:25, 4 June 2011

2011-06-04T14:25:58Z

Sue at 15:38, 16 January 2011

2011-01-16T15:38:54Z

Sue: Created page with '{{infobox |title=Halo |sort=Halo |author=Alexandra Adornetto |reviewer=Loralei Haylock |genre=Teens |summary=A lesson in not judging a book by its cover. A promising start that …'

2011-01-16T15:37:16Z

Created page with '{{infobox |title=Halo |sort=Halo |author=Alexandra Adornetto |reviewer=Loralei Haylock |genre=Teens |summary=A lesson in not judging a book by its cover. A promising start that …'

New review

{{infobox
|title=Halo
|sort=Halo
|author=Alexandra Adornetto
|reviewer=Loralei Haylock
|genre=Teens
|summary=A lesson in not judging a book by its cover. A promising start that descends into fairly vapid boy-swooning. With a plot near identical to ''Twilight'', there's nothing original or entertaining enough to sustain the story over 400+ pages. Borrow don't buy.
|rating=2.5
|buy=Maybe
|borrow=Maybe
|paperback=1907410759
|hardback=
|audiobook=1441875239
|ebook=
|pages=496
|publisher=Atom
|date=January 2011
|isbn=978-1907410758
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907410759</amazonuk>
|amazonus=<amazonus>1907410759</amazonus>
}}

When three angels – Gabriel, Ivy and Bethany – arrive in a quiet town, their mission is to bring good to a world in danger of falling into darkness. They have to conceal their true nature – hiding the glow of their skin, their wings – a task not easy for Bethany, the least experienced of the trio. She's overwhelmed by human life, fascinated by all the experiences available to her in human form. A fascination that leads to a dangerous attraction to human boy, Xavier. Falling in love was not part of the holy mission, and Gabriel and Ivy fear Bethany won't be in the position to save anybody if she continues down the path she's on.

This book is a clear example of why we have the saying 'Don't judge a book by its cover.' The cover is exquisite. The story… not so much.

''Halo'' starts with newly incarnate angel Bethany getting used to her life on Earth. I loved this bit of the story – it was well observed, well written and spoke of great promise for the rest of the book. However, when the story (and I say story in the loosest sense of the word) kicked in, Halo went from intriguing to banal in about three lines.

Why would an angel go to high school? It's never really explained beyond 'fitting in' and Beth seems to be as unclear on her purpose as I was reading it, which didn't help matters either. The fact that she wasn't targeting vulnerable, impressionable teenagers for a bit of the good will treatment made the whole situation ridiculous. Instead, Beth spends her time swooning over Xavier, while her friends swoon over Gabriel. Now, a bit of boy swooning is fine, but ''Halo'' is a chunky book. Swooning can't sustain 400+ pages.

Bethany's innocence, intended to be cute, I think, got annoying very rapidly – especially as she's an angel and supposed to know everything in human knowledge. Surely she'd know the effects of alcohol? For a superpowered angel, Beth was at best vulnerable and in need of a knight in shining armour, at worst a pathetic sap about as endearing as a mouldy potato.

Then there's the rather major issue of the plot being a near direct echo of [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]]. The story is all about Bethany being in love with Xavier, until about three quarters of the way through a threat turns up in the shape of the most overly foreshadowed, 'so obvious to everyone but the character it's actually painful to read' bad guy I've had the displeasure of reading in a long time. What his motivations were beyond, 'hey I'm evil, let's cause some chaos,' I'm not sure. I know angels and demons don't really need motivations, but they have to be logical. Some of the things this bad guy did, much as with Bethany and her siblings, made next to no sense.

It does have its moments of well written observations on humanity, but with most of the plot revolving around a love story with no chemistry, only occasional, throwaway characters ever facing any real peril, and a plot structure so closely echoing ''Twilight'' you'll just want to put the book down and actually read ''Twilight'', ''Halo'' falls far short of a heavenly read. Borrow don't buy.

My thanks to the publishers for sending a copy.

The obvious recommendation for this book is clearly [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]], but as I highly doubt there are many people who haven't read Twilight that would want to, I will suggest LJ Smith's [[Vampire Diaries by L J Smith|Vampire Diaries]] for another supernatural romance-centric story.

{{amazontext|amazon=1907410759}} {{waterstonestext|waterstones=7891509}}

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 |isbn=978-1907410758
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 When three angels – Gabriel, Ivy and Bethany – arrive in a quiet town, their mission is to bring good to a world in danger of falling into darkness. They have to conceal their true nature – hiding the glow of their skin, their wings – a task not easy for Bethany, the least experienced of the trio. She's overwhelmed by human life, fascinated by all the experiences available to her in human form. A fascination that leads to a dangerous attraction to human boy, Xavier. Falling in love was not part of the holy mission, and Gabriel and Ivy fear Bethany won't be in the position to save anybody if she continues down the path she's on.
 This book is a clear example of why we have the saying 'Don't judge a book by its cover.' The cover is exquisite. The story… not so much.
-''Halo'' starts with newly incarnate angel Bethany getting used to her life on Earth. I loved this bit of the story – it was well observed, well written and spoke of great promise for the rest of the book. However, when the story (and I say story in the loosest sense of the word) kicked in, Halo went from intriguing to banal in about three lines.
+''Halo'' starts with newly incarnate angel Bethany getting used to her life on Earth. I loved this bit of the story – it was well observed, well written and spoke of great promise for the rest of the book. However, when the story (and I say 'story' in the loosest sense of the word) kicked in, Halo went from intriguing to banal in about three lines.
-Why would an angel go to high school? It's never really explained beyond 'fitting in' and Beth seems to be as unclear on her purpose as I was reading it, which didn't help matters either. The fact that she wasn't targeting vulnerable, impressionable teenagers for a bit of the good will treatment made the whole situation ridiculous. Instead, Beth spends her time swooning over Xavier, while her friends swoon over Gabriel. Now, a bit of boy swooning is fine, but ''Halo'' is a chunky book. Swooning can't sustain 400+ pages.
+Why would an angel go to high school? It's never really explained beyond 'fitting in' and Beth seems to be as unclear on her purpose as I was reading it, which didn't help matters either. The fact that she wasn't targeting vulnerable, impressionable teenagers for a bit of the goodwill treatment made the whole situation ridiculous. Instead, Beth spends her time swooning over Xavier, while her friends swoon over Gabriel. Now, a bit of boy swooning is fine, but ''Halo'' is a chunky book. Swooning can't sustain 400+ pages.
 Bethany's innocence, intended to be cute, I think, got annoying very rapidly – especially as she's an angel and supposed to know everything in human knowledge. Surely she'd know the effects of alcohol? For a superpowered angel, Beth was at best vulnerable and in need of a knight in shining armour, at worst a pathetic sap about as endearing as a mouldy potato.

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-{{infobox
+{{infobox2
 |title=Halo
 |author=Alexandra Adornetto
@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 |date=January 2011
 |isbn=978-1907410758
-|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907410767</amazonuk>
+|aznuk=1907410767
 }}

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 {{infobox
 |title=Halo
 |author=Alexandra Adornetto
 |reviewer=Loralei Haylock
@@ Line 9: / Line 8: @@
 |buy=Maybe
 |borrow=Maybe
 |pages=496
 |publisher=Atom
@@ Line 40: / Line 35: @@
 The obvious recommendation for this book is clearly [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]], but as I highly doubt there are many people who haven't read Twilight that would want to, I will suggest LJ Smith's [[The Fury (The Vampire Diaries) by L J Smith|Vampire Diaries]] for another supernatural romance-centric story.
-{{amazontext|amazon=1907410767}} {{waterstonestext|waterstones=7891509}}
+{{amazontext|amazon=1907410767}}
 {{commenthead}}

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 My thanks to the publishers for sending a copy.
-The obvious recommendation for this book is clearly [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]], but as I highly doubt there are many people who haven't read Twilight that would want to, I will suggest LJ Smith's [[Vampire Diaries by L J Smith|Vampire Diaries]] for another supernatural romance-centric story.
+The obvious recommendation for this book is clearly [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]], but as I highly doubt there are many people who haven't read Twilight that would want to, I will suggest LJ Smith's [[The Fury (The Vampire Diaries) by L J Smith|Vampire Diaries]] for another supernatural romance-centric story.
 {{amazontext|amazon=1907410759}} {{waterstonestext|waterstones=7891509}}
 {{commenthead}}