Review: Jenny Pox (The Paranormals #1) by JL Bryan

Synopsis (Goodreads):

Jenny has a secret. Her touch spreads a supernatural plague.

She devotes her life to avoiding contact with people, until her senior year of high school, when she meets the one boy she can touch, and she falls in love.

But there's a problem--he's under the spell of his devious girlfriend Ashleigh, who secretly wields the most dangerous power of all.

Now Jenny must learn to use the deadly "Jenny pox" she's fought her entire life to hide, or be destroyed by Ashleigh's ruthless plans.

My Thoughts:  I picked this book up on a whim because it was a sweet, sweet 99 cents and I ended up being blown away by it.  I absolutely loved it and thought everything about it, from the characters to their powers to the dark, dark ending, were fantastic.  I can't remember the last time I went into a book with literally no expectations and ended up liking it this much.  Actually, I do remember.  It wasn't all that long ago, either, but that doesn't take away from the fabulousness of this book in the least.

Jenny is a great character.  She's had to deal with the repercussions of her touch her entire life, from the moment of her birth in fact, and this has made her a loner.  She deals with her lonliness as best she can but she's keenly aware that she'll never be normal.  Finding that she can touch Seth and have a semblance of a normal life with him is eye-opening for her.

The book was really elevated, though, by the diabolical machinations of Ashleigh.  She has such cold-blooded determination to succeed at the things she thinks are important.  Honestly, her fixation on being better than everyone else and manipulating those around her to further her schemes scared the pants off of me.  She was scary.  Stalker-scary.  Creepy monster under the bed scary.  I loved to hate her.  I'd have to say that when she made her best friend pleasure her boyfriend so that she didn't have to was a turning point in the book.  Up until then JL Bryan it did a great job of showing how disassociated from everyone Jenny was and, by comparison, how Ashleigh hid her true nature under the charming good girl act but once Ashleigh crossed that line the book became darker and richer and downright fantastic.

Peppered with casual drug usage and fairly non-explicit sex (well, non-explicit by my standards), this book isn't for the younger teen set.  I still can't get over how imaginative and gripping the story ended up being.  Despite all the books waiting for me to read them, I'm considering picking up book 2 and jumping back into this world immediately.

More books by JL Bryan

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