![\"cover](\"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/graces_eve.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThe Graces\u00a0<\/em>by Laure Eve (\u00a0\u00a0Bookshop.org<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0\u00a0Amazon.com<\/a>\u00a0)<\/p>\n Amulet Books, 2016<\/p>\n ISBN-13 : 978-1419721236<\/p>\n Available: Hardcover, paperback, Kindle edition, audiobook<\/p>\n The narrator of\u00a0The Graces\u00a0<\/em>is new to town, and ready to shed her old identity, including her name. The centers of attention at her school are the Graces, seventeen-year-old twins Thalia and Fenrin, and their younger sister, Summer. The Grace family has been entwined in the town\u2019s history for generations, and there are rumors of witchcraft that surround them. They are a close-knit family that rarely let anyone into their circle, but, renaming herself River, she finds herself welcomed in. River herself is very closed off and rarely volunteers information about her life or family\u2013 she is always thinking about whether she has said or done the \u201cright thing\u201d to be accepted by the Graces, who she believes have a magical key to helping her solve her problems.<\/p>\n River, Summer, and a group of girls from school attempt to cast a love spell, which River secretly focuses on Fenrin. Developing a close friendship with Summer, who is her own age, River also attempts to create situations that will give her and Fenrin the opportunity for close contact, but these are always interrupted, and finally end in tragedy.<\/p>\n It\u2019s easy to read the first part of this book and see the narrator as merely anxious, needy, and maybe a little manipulative, a wishful thinker swept up by a glamorous and mysterious family. The second part gives us a look under the surface of it all, and there\u2019s where it starts getting disturbing, as there are some very unsettling powers that come to the fore.<\/p>\n There is a lot of suspension of disbelief required to buy into this book, but Eve keeps things erratic enough, with her unreliable narrator, and enough gaps between the real and unreal to keep a reader going. A couple of things are real flaws, though. The book uses a trope I loathe, of the \u201calways absent but overprotective parents,\u201d and the plot had some big holes in it that made the actions of certain characters very confusing, and led to an ending that was only partly satisfactory (there is a sequel, so hopefully some of that will be resolved in it). None of the characters are especially likable, but there\u2019s enough intrigue and \u201cfairy tale\u201d atmosphere to appeal to a certain kind of teenage girl. Recommended.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" **Cross Posted from the Circulation Desk.** The Graces\u00a0by Laure Eve (\u00a0\u00a0Bookshop.org\u00a0|\u00a0\u00a0Amazon.com\u00a0) Amulet Books, 2016 ISBN-13 : 978-1419721236 Available: Hardcover, paperback, Kindle edition, audiobook The narrator of\u00a0The Graces\u00a0is new to town, and ready to shed her old identity, including her name. The centers of attention at her school are the Graces, seventeen-year-old twins Thalia and Fenrin, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[62,53,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-glbt","category-witches","category-ya-books"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3Eu9f-y2","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2110"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2110\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2111,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2110\/revisions\/2111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}