Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Genre: Young Adult Science Fiction
Publication Date: December 27, 2011
Pages: 336
Source: Received an e-ARC for review from NetGalley
Every other day, Kali D’Angelo is a normal sixteen-year-old girl. She goes to public high school. She attends pep rallies. She’s human.
And then every day in between . . .She’s something else entirely.
Though she still looks like herself, every twenty-four hours predatory instincts take over and Kali becomes a feared demon-hunter with the undeniable urge to hunt, trap, and kill zombies, hellhounds, and other supernatural creatures. Kali has no idea why she is the way she is, but she gives in to instinct anyway. Even though the government considers it environmental terrorism.
When Kali notices a mark on the lower back of a popular girl at school, she knows instantly that the girl is marked for death by one of these creatures. Kali has twenty-four hours to save her and, unfortunately, she’ll have to do it as a human. With the help of a few new friends, Kali takes a risk that her human body might not survive. . .and learns the secrets of her mysterious condition in the process.
My Opinion
Going into this book I thought it was going to be a paranormal, and I was pleasantly surprised when it turned out to be science fiction. I’ve never read anything like Every Other Day before. Jennifer Lynn Barnes put an interesting spin onto a creature that’s been a little overdone recently in YA fiction, and the originality in Every Other Day was a nice treat. The world was an alternate version of our world. Instead of Darwin discovering only evolution on his journey, he discovered preternatural creatures — the scientific equivalent of the paranormal creatures in different mythologies.
The main character, Kali, is half-human, half-preternatural. She’s spunky, daring, and adventurous, and I really enjoyed reading from her point of view. Also, since her father is a University professor of preternatural science, she was able to give good explanations to the reader about the science of the world she lived in. I also really loved the two secondary characters, Skylar and Bethany. Both of them were likable in their own ways. I wish the love story had a little bit more to it, but even so, I still found the book enjoyable.
I don’t want to give anything away, but there are things that happened in the ending that took me by surprise. Every Other Day is not a predictable book, and it was nice to not know what was coming. (Even though some things that happened were really sad). I loved reading it, and highly recommend it!
I loved Every Other Day! It was a book that I wasn't expecting to really like – but I did. 🙂
Nice review, Michelle! I was just looking for a good book with unpredictable twists. I'll def. look into this one!
Giselle
Xpresso Reads