Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles) by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

A bit about the book
In Ethan Wate's hometown there lies the darkest of secrets . . .

There is a girl.
Slowly, she pulled the hood from
her head . . . green eyes, black hair.
Lena Duchannes.

There is a curse.
On the sixteenth moon, of the sixteenth year,
the book will take what it's been promised.
And no one can stop it.

In the end, there is a grave.

Lena and Ethan become bound together by a deep, powerful love. But Lena is cursed and, on her sixteenth birthday, her fate will be decided.
Ethan never even saw it coming.

What I thought
Brilliant book! I read this book when it first came out and I loved it, so when I read it again to get ready for reading Beautiful Darkness (the Caster Chronicles 2nd book), I enjoyed it more than the first time I read it.
Ethan lives in a small town called Gatlin where everybody knows everybody and Ethan can't wait to leave as soon as he graduates because even though Ethan loves Gatlin he just seems to think there's more to life than this small town. Then Lena Duchannes moves in with her uncle, Macon Ravenwood (everyone in Gatlin call him Old Man Ravenwood), who is the town's recluse, so it's obvious the towns people are going to put Lena in the same category as her uncle and treat her different. But as soon as Ethan sees Lena he knows she's the one for him and he is the only one that befriends her and finds out about her family's secret.
I fell in love with Ethan and Lena, they definitely have that whole star-crossed lovers thing going on and I'm a sucker for books like that. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, all the characters were great and I actually liked Ridley as well, she was spunky and fun and I think at least one character has to be like that. I'm just getting ready to read the next book in the series, Beautiful Darkness, and I hope it is as good as its predecessor, because some sequels can become too much or dull which I have found with some series I've read. But I'm sure it will be just as good if not better, as I have heard good things about it. So I'm off now to start on the next book, oh, and one last thing, everyone needs to read this book, as I've already said, it's brilliant!