Review: Nocturne by Christine Johnson (Claire De Lune #2)

THE DETAILS:
Pages:355
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy
Release Date: October 2011
RRP: $16.99
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Received from Publisher

THE BLURB:
 Claire couldn't be happier as it seems like her life is finally settling down. She's been fully initiated into her family's pack of female werewolves, her best friend Emily is back in town, and the gorgeous Matthew Engle is now her boyfriend.
But when a new girl comes to town and threatens to break up Claire's friendship and relationship, everything starts to unravel. Not only is the new girl trying to steal her best friend and boyfriend, but it seems that she may know more about Claire than she's letting on. Knowing Claire's secret breaks all the rules of the pack, and the consequences may be more than Claire can handle...

THE REVIEW:
This book completely proves me wrong with my theory about sequels. I think I enjoyed 'Nocturne' just as much as I enjoyed 'Claire De Lune'. There you go not all sequels are bad...

I learnt two major lessons with this book. 1. Not everyone is as confident as you think they are and 2. Don't jump to conclusions. Just because Claire has this ability to turn into a wolf doesn't mean that she has higher confidence. Her confidence is even lower because she is so paranoid about all the things that could go wrong. I think characters with low confidence are easier for most people to relate to.

I really enjoyed how the writer put Claire's actual thought/intended meaning in italics after the quote. This really showed off how paranoid she was. It also made everything more concise and it was easier to understand what she actually meant or thought it meant. I also thought all the sarcasm made for a very interesting read.

Claire has to juggle so many things in this book (boyfriend, werewolf meetings, friends) and I think this will ring true with a lot of girls (well, not the werewolf part). A lot of books I have read about girls who find out they have supernatural powers or girls who go out with guys with supernatural powers don't have characters that actually have lives before the supernatural discovery. They seem to have very simple boring lives with no/ hardly any friends, extra curricular activities (sport etc) or a boyfriend. So they don't really have to juggle things and they can just drop whatever they are doing because of the supernatural circumstances. I thought 'Nocturne' was much more realistic this way.

Claire also has to deal with a new girl at school. The girl wants to hang out with Claire and her friend Emily, but Claire gets a little suspicious and jealous. This is also a very real high school situation (apart from the suspicious part). Some people get really worried about how someone else coming into the group might affect their friendship. I haven't seen this one in too many books so I thought it was good that another author used it.

Overall, I gave this book 4.5 Stars. It was very creative and entertaining. This book was also a very quick read. I think that people who enjoyed Claire de Lune would enjoy this book. If you haven't read Claire de Lune and you like reading teenage fantasy (especially werewolf books) then you should give the series ago. I also recommend this series to girls who like contemporary fiction and are trying to branch over into fantasy. Claire de Lune isn't too violent and has plenty of normal girl stuff in it as well.



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