Need (Need Pixies, Book 1)

Since finishing Breaking Dawn, I have been in a reading funk. My post paranormal romance pout came from Edward/Bella withdrawl and the conviction the no one could outdo Meyer but Meyer...until Carrie Jones' Need. Need filled my "need" (sorry for the unavoidable pun) for a deliciously dark romance with edgy action and mind-blowing paranormal fantasy. In fact, Need edged out Twilight in some important ways.

Main character Zara, grieving from her father's recent death, shows much more character arc than Meyer's Bella. In this page-turner, Zara transforms from a withdrawn, morose girl to a Laura Croft-style monster-whipping machine. Instead of waiting to be rescued by her gorgeous alpha male boyfriend, Zara hunts her hunters, turning the tables on them through her own ingenuity. This was a refreshing change from Meyer's Bella who is a strong, yet passive, damsel in distress. It was a relief to see Bella finally break out in Breaking Dawn (darn- another pun) and fight back- even if it was in a defensive/shield creating capacity. In Jones' Need, we don't have to wait four books for evidence of our heroine's backbone. A more comparable character to Zara would be Holly Black's strong and sarcastic Val in Valiant.

Zara's love interest, Nick, is hot and amazingly, as might be appreciated by conservatives looking for an edgy book that doesn't go too far, a virgin! Their first kiss is hot and pure with Zara comparing the feel of Nick's lips to an angel's breath. It melted my heart and set it pounding. It is every bit as romantic as Twilight's heart-stopping Chapter 13 "Meadow Scene."

Like Twilight, the setting in Need is unusual and interesting. The weather is equally miserable, this time deep Northeast winter. The frigid cold is a stark contrast to the hot romance and action brewing in this backwoods mystery town. The secondary characters are better in Need than in Twilight- particulary Zara's friends. Her quirky band of outsider pals share banter that is laugh-out-loud funny, breaking up intense moments of darkness and angst.

I highly recommend this book to any like me who are grieving the finish of Twilight. Need is an antedote and a promise that the renaissance of paranormal romance is far from over.

I'll start with the positive, then I will detail the ???? factor and then end by saying something nice.

Carrie Jones can write. I think if that were not there, nothing could have enticed me to finish reading this book.

Having said that. This was a blatant knock off of the "Twilight" books. Young lady moved to the obscure wilds to live with a relative. Instead of a father that is law enforcement (Twilight), this is Grandma and she works as an EMT. Two young men, mysterious and compelling at school.

Werewolves and other were animals, Sparkling creatures similar to vampires. And Zara (young lady) being stalked by the scary creatures.

Once the story develops past the Twilight Series knock off, it simply stews in a layer of predictability.

I think that this author has the capacity to really grow in this craft. The plot absolutely must be more original than this was and the characters a little more fully developed.

I would have given the whole thing one star except that I am optimistic that Carrie Jones will come out with more developed stories. (I mean, I go back and read the first book or two of a favorite of mine now and WOW!)

I am almost thirty and still really enjoyed reading this YA book. I have ended up just skimming through plenty of books of the same genre due to boredom. This was definitely not one of those books. I was fully interested from beginning to end.

The characters are well developed and have believable relationships. The plot is predictable but still good. It does not have any vampires in it but does have shape shifters and pixies.

If you enjoyed reading Wicked Lovely, which I did, you will probably like this book, too. Both books have similarities, but Need is not a rip-off. Another book I recommend is Evernight, which does have vampires.

This novel is often compared to Stephenie Meyer's Twilight which puzzles me. Apart from the "mysterious boy likes new girl theme", which by the way exists in a lot of novels and not just in Twilight, the story and style of writing between the two are very different. In fact, they should not be even be compared. Having read all of Stephenie Meyer's novels, I can't help but put her a few notches higher over Carrie Jones in two areas: (1) excellence in narration and description and (2) very thorough story-telling. These two are clearly lacking with Need.

The plot of Need shows potential and intrigue, however the execution was done poorly. There are inconsistencies in the characterization and inadequacy in the story. For example, if Zara is such a phobic person, how did she instantly gain courage to run after this `mysterious, eerie, and dangerous' stranger who was calling out to her in the woods? There is also a failure to explain (1) how Zara's mother, a mere human, became the interest of the Pixie King, (2) why did it take seventeen years for the Pixie King to feel this `need'? No catalyst was really explained, (3) If the Pixie King could fly, then why not fly over the trap that was built surrounding its home?, (4) How could Nick not know there are Pixies in the area and there is an abundance of them? If Zara's grandmother knows Nick's secret, and she consistently appears to trust him, then why not explain to him the existence of such creatures since she was involved with Pixies in the past? There are many more `holes' in the story. I couldn't help but express frustration with the obvious lack of clarity.

However, these is charm in Ms. Jones' writing. The use of phobias as chapter titles was particularly interesting. The adventure she created complete with pixies, shape-shifters, and loyal friends shows a potential for a sequel, which is indeed planned for in a book called `Captivate'. I hope in this next one the author realizes that her genre might be young adults, but it does not mean she should write down to her readers.

Sure it had the DNA of Twilight, but the characters were never developed. I didn't care about them at all. Plot and storyline were silly and too unrealistic for me. Also hated the cheesy ending. There are much better fantasy books! Try Fragile Eternity by Melissa Marr or City of Bones by Cassandra Clare.

This is a good book. Why do people have to go and ruin it by comparing every single detail to Twilight? It is so annoying that every single teenage girl in America is comparing every single book in existence to Twilight. "That's like Twilight!" "That's totally Stephenie Meyer!" "Plagiarism!" Dear god, Stephenie Meyer didn't create any of the concepts in her book; she has likely copied other writers in her own work. Can people just stop with the Twilight and read the book without complaint? Twilight isn't some well-written book. Calm down and let it go. And I understand that Twilight is the bible to a lot of girls, but come on, aren't we getting a little too obsessed with something that isn't even that good and actually harmless in retrospect? Sorry if I offend anyone, but I had to say this. Need is a good book, if not a little flawed in means of characterization.

We all know a good book about a chapter in, or at least we know if the book is going to hold our interest. The more books you read the more apt you are to give a book a few more chapters if it doesn't flow just right. In Need's instance I knew two pages in I would finish it. It was not until a few chapters in that I noticed the choppy writing, small annoyances (i.e. Zara's name being repeated by every character in the book 500 times), thin story line, and Zara's immature point of view.

Was the book enjoyable, yes, but it left a little to be desired in the end. There were so many holes in the story I kept reading in hopes they would be closed. They weren't.

Zara the main character is a Junior in high school; her step-father has just passed away from a heart attack. Her mother sends her to live with her Father's mother in Maine. Her grandmother is a hearty good natured women who lives in the boondocks and works as a EMT. Zara is of course suffering from depression considering the fact that her father just passed. She feels as though her mother has sent her away because she couldn't be bothered after the death. She also is obsessed with Amnesty International and phobias. She likes to repeat phobias to herself when she is uncomfortable.

Zara meets a boy (Nick) at school who looks like a jock but acts nothing like one. He seems unnaturally concerned about her well fare and is pretty attentive. She also befriends a sweet bouncy girl names Issie, a boy named Dyven (Issie's bo), and an overachiever named Ian who also has eyes for her.

Zara keeps noticing a tall shadow of a man in the woods who she believes to be stalking her, but the reality or strangeness of the fact is never actually addressed. In fact a lot of things are never really addressed properly.

It turns out that the small town that Zara has moved to is full of Pixies and Shape Shifters. Her mother knew this, because her mother grew up there. Yet, her mother decided to send her away to the strange town knowing all the while that the Pixies were dangerous blood hungry kidnappers and murders. Yes, that's correct, the pixies are not sweet little glitter dusting tinker bells. Instead the Pixies are large males, and beautiful females who live in the town and "glamour" their way into peoples lives.

There has been a string of kidnappings; young men gone missing. Supposedly the young men are being drained of blood by the pixies in the woods, they need to do this until the King of the Pixies finds his queen. The only protection from the crazed Pixies is iron or shape shifters.

Spoilers:

The twists in the story are easy to see coming. It turns out that Ian is a pixie who intends to steal Zara (who happens to be the illegitimate daughter of the pixie king) for himself. Her mother is also half pixie and the king wants her back. Her step-dad meanwhile who is deceased was a werewolf (shape-shifter) that used to protect her and her mother from the insane pixies. Zara's love interest (Nick) is also a werewolf and her grandmother is a tiger (shape-shifter). Dyven is a eagle (shape-shifter) - phew!

Its never explained why the Pixies need what they need (Zara), not fully. Its never really explained why Zara's mother thought it would be a good idea to send her unknowing and defenseless daughter back to Maine to be hunted by pixies either. To top it all off the King pixie seems to have a unhealthy perverted interest in his own daughter. I mean imagine your biological father calling your name from the forest repeating that he needs you, over and over again. Uh okay???

The end of this book is the worst part. The shape-shifters and Zara all band together and trapped the pixies in a house with iron rail way ties and silverwear tapped to the window, and thats it. I guess all those pixies, including Zara's real father are just left to rot.

This book is hard to rate. It was a fun read, but it was certainly not a great one. What the writer is really good at is giving you highly likable real charters that you care for. The grandmother and Nick for instance are the best parts of the book. Zara's strained relationship with her mother is realistic, and her undying love for her lost Step-father is palpable. I don't regret reading the book, I suppose I just thought I'd get more out of it in the beginning then I did in the end.

If I had the option, I would give this book 2 and a half stars. I thought there were some blatant similarities to Twilight, a book that I thought was mediocre at best, so needless to say, I was not too happy when I started seeing similarities. At least Need is about 300 pages shorter than Twilight so that's one good thing.

I felt like the plot could have been stronger. It's been a while since I've read a book that I could unravel the plot practically as soon as I started reading the book...

*****SPOILERS*******

I mean, who didn't know that Nick was a werewolf? And really, why the heck did it take Zara so long to figure it out. I mean she left the room with a wolf in it, came back and found a naked guy with the same blanket covering him and she asks, "Where'd the wolf go?" Really? Is that the first question you'd ask especially after you and your friends were just talking about pixies and were-animals at the library? And who hadn't figured out that Ian was involved? Of course the overly friendly guy would have an ulterior motive and the standoffish guy is really the hero.

I did enjoy the phobias Zara seemed obsessed with. It was a funny and quirky aspect of her personality that made her come to life. I had no idea this was an aspect of the story and found it ironic that I had just looked at a list of phobias to see if mine actually had a name...alas, there is no clinical term for fear of hillbillies. Now I don't mean just people from the south, some of my best friends live in the south. I mean the snaggle-toothed, inbred, Deliverance kind of hillbillies!

As for the writing, I do think Jones has talent. The plot for me just fell flat. I do think she had quite a few redundancies and really awkward sentences. This one stood out to me: My foot tip touches a small clump of brown fur.

When I first read that sentence I got hung up on, My foot tip...it's just awkward and there were a lot of sentences like this. Also, the word ALL was overused. I get that this was told in the first person and it therefore was in Zara's voice, but sentences like: Everything inside me goes ALL jittery." Or "The couch is ALL flipped over." Like I said, I get that this is supposed to be Zara's voice and how she talks/thinks but after a while of reading sentences like this, it just becomes passive and pulled me out of the story. All becomes a filler that slows down the read.

All in all, it was a fast read. I just think the plot was flat, and the conflict was over without ever starting. The villain was never really fleshed out and the motives/involvement of Zara's family was stretched out to create a mystery that Zara should have figured out halfway through the book. Beautiful cover art, though.

I picked up Need because of the intriguing cover art and I found it to be an enjoyable YA fantasy novel. I liked the character of Zara although I was irritated when she foolishly put herself in danger. I admired Zara's desire to make a difference in the world through Amnesty International. I found the romance to be satisfying but not intense. I am glad that there will be a sequel because the ending seems to beg for one. I hope that there will be more character development in the next book, particularly for Nick, Devyn, and Issie. I also hope that the sequel will be even more suspenseful now that the groundwork has been established.

I would recommend this title to fans of YA paranormal romance and to readers who like spunky heroines.

"Need" by Carrie Jones is a story about a girl who feels empty and dead inside after her stepfather's death four months before and is sent away to cope with his death. She's sent by her mother to live with her grandmother in Maine in hopes that a change of scenery will help her come to terms with her father's death.

First of all, I don't understand why people are comparing this to "Twilight." The "Twilight" series has ruined the vampire and fantasy genre in my opinion, and I don't think "Need" serves any comparison to Stephenie Meyer's series, which is a good thing. This novel actually has a plot that was written very well and Carrie Jones clearly didn't make a selfish effort to write for herself. Thank you, Carrie!

The protagonist, Zara, has two ways of dealing with her father's death: 1) she ties a little string around her finger and tugs at it whenever she thinks of her dad. 2) She recites phobias (even when she's scared or worried about something). Zara is also a hippie, a fast runner and a superstar member of Amnesty International and loves John Lennon, which I found refreshing. What I found interesting about Zara was that I didn't see her as a self-obsessed teenager full of angst; she was just a lonely girl who missed her dad, which is very central to the majority of the book.

Zara knows that someone has been following her and he's been leaving gold dust behind. Her new friends Devyn, Issie and Nick help her find out why this man is following her and why he's leaving gold dust. They find out he's a pixie king and he's the reason why one boy had gone missing just before Zara arrived. And it's happened before over a decade ago and now it's happening again because another boy just disappeared. Many more will disappear if the pixie king's need isn't thwarted.

Jones' plotting reminded me a little of "Tithe" by Holly Black except for the whole changeling thing. Secrets are unfolded and enemies are revealed. Towards the end, Zara's love for Amnesty International comes in handy when she and her friends and grandmother plan a way to detain the pixies.

I found the character of Nick to be really animating because of his superhero complex which fit very nicely with his being a werewolf. The only complaint I have about this book is the dialogue between Zara and Nick. Some of it sounded too silly, but I guess it was just Zara's character, whom I did like. There were two plot twists that I didn't see coming, so I was happy with the way the book ended. I gave this book four stars because I loved the whole idea of phobias and every chapter being named after a phobia. Jones related the phobias with all of Zara's problems/worries, which I thought was pretty compelling and quirky.