Title: Pretty DeadAuthor: Francesca Lia Block
Publish Date: September 2009
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Pages: 197pp
ISBN: 0061547859
Classification: Fiction
Genre: Supernatural/Urban Fantasy
Age Range: 12 and up
Price: $16.99
Annotation: Charlotte seems to have it all, she lives in a lavish mansion with no adult supervision and has everything she has ever wanted, except she is lonely because Charlotte is a vampire.
Summary: Charlotte Emerson has been a teenage girl for centuries now. She is a vampire and has lived through many fashions and many experiences. After settling down from a life of luxury, she decides to go to school and meets a girl named Emily, someone who reminds Charlotte of her deceased brother Charles. Charlotte begins to live life through Emily, but soon becomes jealous of Emily’s human life. Emily wishes to be turned but Charlotte refuses to damn her. Inevitably, Charlotte loses Emily. She finds herself falling in love with Emily's boyfriend, Jared, who also reminds her of her dead twin brother, Charles. As her love grows, she begins to lose her immortality and is possibly becoming more human. For the first time in over one hundred years, Charlotte is able to cry. Unfortunately, Jared is not content with being a human; he begs Charlotte to make him a vampire.
Evaluation: You either love Francesca Lia Block or you hate her. I love her and I love her take on vampires. The story was comparable to Anne Rice’s Interview with a Vampire, as a young girl was turned into a vampire to appease her master and then tires of her long unchanging life and seeks out a new one. I found Pretty Dead to be a quick read, in that it was interesting and unpredictable and carried the same poetic edge that all of Francesca novellas have.
Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness:
- Fear of the unknown.
- Grieving.
- Yearning to have a companion.
- Losing people you love.
- Acceptance.
Reason this book was chosen: I am a Francesca Lia Block fan as well as a vampire fan, though this novel was more about love then the supernatural element. Anyone who loves Francesca will want to read her take on vampires.
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