White Cat (review)

I've been posting quite a bit of my writing lately (other than that post about my mother's habit for bringing random furniture into our home) so, to switch it up, I'm going to post a review today. I read White Cat by Holly Black a week or two ago and really enjoyed it. It kind of reminded me of Graceling and Inception, both of which I enjoyed. Brief overview? Okay:

Cassel (I say it Cuh-sel whereas my sisters pronounce it like castle) lives in an alternate reality that is mostly like ours only there are supernaturally gifted people walking around who are referred to as 'curse workers'.* These people range from luck workers to physical workers to memory workers and everything in between. Cassel's entire family are workers. All except for him.

All his life, he's been attempting to be normal. He goes to boarding school and had a girlfriend (who he apparently wasn't a good enough conman to keep) and a reputation as the school bookie. Then one night he wakes up after a dream in which a cat stole his tongue and he is on top of his dorm building in his boxers. The school thinks he was trying to kill himself and so they suspend him. Because of this, he has to go stay with his grandfather and clean out his parent's house because it's a mess (his dad is dead and his mom's in jail). The novel goes from there.

It was kind of a mystery, contemporary only alternate reality and the blurbs on the back said romance but that was just one big disappointment. I liked Cassel. He had some problems (trust issues, mostly) but he evolved a bit and he was charming and entertaining. The were some seemingly random plot threads (what was with the girlfriend bit?) but the characters were endearing (and frightening) and it was a pretty good book. I liked the writing. At the end, though, I felt like something was missing, like it wasn't finished or something. I can't describe it exactly but it felt wrong. It was completely captivating and I recommend it if you're wanting to stay up until 1am reading. If not, try The Bell Jar. That's pretty good, too.

*See the Graceling similarity? That's basically the only one.