Title: Glass Houses
Author: Rachel Caine
Series: The Morganville Vampires #1
Genre: Young Adult/Paranormal
Publisher: NAL
Number of Pages: 239
Source: My copy
Cover Thoughts: This is nothing like how I pictured Claire or Glass house to look like!
College freshman Claire Danvers has had enough of her nightmarish dorm situation. When Claire heads off-campus, the imposing old house where she finds a room may not be much better. Her new roommates don't show many signs of life, but they'll have Claire's back when the town's deepest secrets come crawling out, hungry for fresh blood.
I feel like I am probably one of the last people who haven't ever read this series. I'm not sure why, except I was burned out on vampire YA books for what seemed like forever. I'm not sure what made me check this book out from the library, but I'm glad I finally caved and decided to see what all the hype about this series was all about.
I'll be the first to admit that this book is not the most thought provoking book ever. In fact, it's pretty much paranormal fluff and completely predictable. But you know what? I liked it anyway. I had this read in almost one sitting. I'm still not quite sure why I enjoyed the heck out of this book. There were so many things that were just unbelievable in it. The college problems experienced by
Claire sounded just like high school to me, and honestly? I never saw anyone bully or give others a hard time for being smart or what they looked like when I was in college. (Maybe age has made all of that disappear?) Also, how on earth could she miss so many classes and not have been kicked out for non attendance??? Granted this is a town where weird things happen all the time, but come on! I think if all the things that happened to Claire had happened to me (being pushed down the stairs, robbed, etc.) I would have a.) asked to move dorms or b.) ask to be sent home even if it meant giving up on something I loved. The whole unrealistic college thing almost kept me from really enjoying the book. so I'm assuming that she wrote Claire's experiences the way she did so that the high school crowd could relate to it, but honestly? It frustrated me to no end!
However, despite the problems that could have been solved easily and the unrealistic college thing, I ended up loving the book-mainly because of Shane and Michael. After Claire experiences all the things I mentioned above, she does move out of the dorms (what's weird is that no one from the university seemed to care) and into Glass House. Shane, Michael and Eve are her roommates and are all 18. Normally I have problems with teens who 18 hanging out with a 16 year old, but in this case I didn't and I loved the love interest between Shane and Claire-I think mainly because it wasn't instalove. I loved the back and forth banter and they gave each other crap when they thought the other was out of line. Michael was such an interesting character and I loved the air of mystery surrounding him and how Claire discovers his secret.
This book was just pure fun and isn't meant to be taken too seriously. I loved that it was short-just 236 pages, and could be read almost in one sitting. I have to admit that once I was halfway though the book I downloaded the rest of the books from the library. I can't wait to read them!
