7/10, a good book, though I have seen the concept of revival in other books before. ( )

After a car accident, Ember has the gift of touch that makes everything die. She meets Hayden who claims her curse is a gift and can help her, but whose stepfather she may not be able to trust.

Although I consider this book one of my favorites, I don't think I would be emotionally prepared to re-read if I ever decided to do so. For most of the book I felt sad and depressed but I was still invested in the story, well, that's understandable since Ember, the main character's touch kills. I guess I shouldn't have expected her to be all lively and happy, not being able to have that connection with someone is certainly a depressing existence. This is one of those books that I had to step away from a few times, it was so intense with emotions, a lot of anger, sorrow, heartache, even paranoia. Ember felt she's cursed and soulless, she's estranged from the life she had before her curse, and she is all alone to deal with her current life. Which ever way you look at it, Ember is a very stubborn or determined girl, she was not able to be swayed one way or another about what she believes, and doesn't put her trust in anyone and carries a lot of anger, understandably.

I felt Embers emotions every step of the way, when Ember was pissed off, I felt pissed off. Although, I pleaded for her to reign in her emotions because I saw that she needed perspective and wasn't going to get it with all that baggage of feelings she was carrying around. She alone has to deal with what's happened to her and make sure her family is safe and on top of all that, she has to figure out if she can control her ability.

The book is called Cursed so I guess Armentrout did the title justice, it's not a sweet story about a girl whose skin kills with just one touch, it's a heart-wrenching emotional explosion.

So happy it's a non-series for two reasons: one, I don't have to wait for the next book to be released and two, I don't how I would've been able to continue it, so two defeats reason one.

So, I think I should clear up that I really do like this book, I just tend to get completely lost in well written books no matter how difficult the topic and I have to be honest how it made me feel and also see past (or accept) the feelings I felt because maybe they are the feelings the author wants to convey. One of the things I liked about this book was the romance between Ember and Hayden, alone, no romantic triangle. ( )

Ember's life is a far cry from awesome. She died in a car accident two years ago, and Olivia, her gifted little sister, brought her back. Ever since then, anything Ember touches - plants, animals, even people - immediately dies. As if that isn't bad enough, her mother mentally checked out when her dad died, the whole school thinks she's a freak because she's covered in scars, and the life insurance money from her dad is running out. Things couldn't get any worse - until they do. Ember and her family are all but kidnapped by the mysterious Mr. Cromwell, who seems to collect gifted children. He's really after Olivia, but takes Ember and her mother as part of the package.

I was really excited to get a free book from Jennifer Armentrout. I've seen her naming popping up everywhere as the Lux and Covenant series gain popularity. I'm not ashamed to say that I just bought Obsidian and it's sitting at the top of my to-read pile. And maybe it's because of all that hype, but Cursed really did not live up to my expectations at all.

First off, the whole touch of death thing has been done a lot, and there's nothing particularly special about this version. The plot was eerily similar to a book I read a couple years ago that was probably done better. It also reminded me of the show Pushing Daisies, except that the touch of death and touch of life are split between two different characters in Cursed. There wasn't anything spectacular or new or interesting in the plot. It was pieces of many things I've watched or read before stitched together.

Speaking of the characters, I didn't really care for any of the main ones.

Ember was an incredibly weak character and terrible role model. On her own, she's dedicated to her sister and constantly works to improve their lives, but once she's swept up by Mr. Cromwell, her focus turns to completely selfish things. But, of course, she gets upset when anybody else pays attention to Olivia, because clearly they're just trying to take her place. Ember does, to her credit, think it's a little off that Hayden lurks in the shadows, watches her sleep, and follows her around, but she's so blinded by his good looks that she doesn't really care after about page 50.

Hayden is a spoiled little brat who either doesn't understand emotions or just doesn't care, because he strings Ember along and then acts like he doesn't understand why she's upset when he shuts down and ignores her for weeks. His blind devotion to his adoptive family struck me as a little weird, too, and if there had been a sequel to this book, I would have liked to learn more about it. I mean, I love my family and all, but if you tell me that one of them has been hurting you, I'm going to make a sincere effort to find out whether or not it's true. Not the case for Hayden, who dismisses Ember as a crazypants when she suggests that the person taunting her might be somehow involved with Mr. Cromwell.

Mr. Cromwell is probably the least likable of them all, since he collects these gifted children but refuses to explain why. He threatens to send Ember to the ominous "Facility" if she doesn't learn to control her gift, but makes no move to help her learn to control it. He discourages her from involving herself with "outsiders," but also disapproves of her friendship with Hayden. He also has her best friend's memory wiped to the point where he doesn't even remember who Ember is, all because he had a sneaking suspicion that Ember had told him about her gift.

Phoebe was also a particularly terrible character - an empath who is "overcome" with all of Ember's negative emotions but makes no move to help her feel welcome. She just secretly tries to make Ember run away by making her feel less welcome, thereby increasing the negative emotions she wanted to avoid! What's wrong with this girl? If she'd just tried to strike up a friendship with Ember, she could have avoided a whole lot of unpleasantness.

The only character I can say I really cared for was Parker, and he was in maybe like six paragraphs total. That tells you a lot about the characters and how terribly they're written.

The only thing preventing me from giving this book one star is that the writing flowed pretty well and I was never bored. I was disappointed in most everything else.

I received a free copy of Cursed from Amazon's Kindle First program. ( )

I have mixed feelings about this one. There was a fair amount of weird, stalker-like behavior on the part of the love interest, and a lot of secretive behavior from the adults who were supposedly only interested in the well-being of the heroine and her sister. I mainly finished it to see who had murdered their father and was terrorizing the heroine. ( )