Strange Girl by Christopher Pike
Series: Stand-alone
Published by Simon Pulse on November 17th 2015
Genres: Young Adult, Paranormal
Pages: 413
Format: Paperback
Source: Publisher
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Rating:

I received this book for free from Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

From the moment Fred meets Aja, he knows she’s different. She’s pretty, soft-spoken, shy—yet seems to radiate an unusual peace. Fred quickly finds himself falling in love with her.
Then strange things begin to happen around Aja. A riot breaks out that Aja is able to stop by merely speaking a few words. A friend of Fred’s suffers a serious head injury and has a miraculous recovery.
Yet Aja swears she has done nothing.
Unfortunately, Fred is not the only one who notices Aja’s unique gifts. As more and more people begin to question who Aja is and what she can do, she’s soon in grave danger. Because none of them truly understands the source of Aja’s precious abilities—or their devastating cost.
Love Aja or hate her—you will never forget her.
In Strange Girl, number-one bestselling author Christopher Pike has created the rarest of novels—a love story that swings between a heart-pounding mystery and a stirring mystical journey.

I have to admit, from the moment I read the blurb, I was sold on this book. A girl with special abilities that carry an unimaginable cost? Yes, please.
I wanted to love this book, I really did. I was so hooked on the blurb I couldn’t wait to read it, but it ultimately fell a little short for me.

I want to talk first about what I liked about the book. I really liked that it felt like it was written as a sort of memoir told of the events of Fred’s life and how he met the mysterious girl named Aja. I really loved the way it reads. The idea behind the story was interesting enough, just I guess not what I expected and honestly I liked Aja more than I liked Fred.

There was romance in the story, but it did nothing for me. Honestly, it was kind of meh. Maybe it was because I honest to goodness disliked Fred. I did not like his attitude, I did not like some of the things he said or thought about Aja and overall I just did not love his character. I just could not connect on the romance, it was sudden, it was odd, and overall a bit boring.

The plot was interesting, but I felt like there was a dig at religion in a way. This is a YA novel I felt like that could have been left out of it.

The story progressed quickly, characters offered up the info quickly. Fred was annoying and boring, and flew off the handle way too easily. Honestly, I felt like the author was bored with his own writing because the twist that was added at the end felt out of place and so random my head was spinning. (Also, someone watches too many action movies - cough)

There was an interesting take on people being selfish and greedy, especially in the end and what it cost. I wanted to throttle the character for asking Aja for what she did, I did not think it was fair, it was greedy, and I guess a bit part of the human nature.

I wanted to love this book, I did and I tried, but it just fell quite a bit short with me. I did give it three stars because I did enjoy it, to an extent. Just some things did not work for me