By the purest chance (or, more likely, some unacknowledged hunger for the supernatural), I happened to read Bliss, by Lauren Myracle, and Swoon, by Nina Malkin, during the same week. At first glance, the two books share some uncanny similarities:
- Fish-out-of-water psychic protagonist newly attending high school in a snotty upper-middle-class community
- Ghostly being with intentions to possess the body of the protagonist’s closest friend
- One-word titles that could easily double new fragrances about to be released by the Pussycat Dolls*
I’m afraid that’s where the similarities end, though. You see, the reader is expected to want to make out with the ghostly Sinclair Youngblood Powers of Swoon (tagline: “Sin is coming... prepare to Swoon!”). Even when he’s trapped in the body of her cheerleader cousin, the narrator can’t stop mauling him. Unfortunately, young Sin has more dastardly plans than playing kissyface with teenage girls. Not really, really, mean plans, though. Nothing that would get in the way of plenty of soulful gazing.
As for Bliss? Well, Myracle’s spirit announces its presence by telepathically shouting things like “Tomb. Trapped. Blood. Blood!” You do not want to kiss that ghost. You want to run far, far away. Of course, the heroine, Bliss in the Morning Dew, can’t bring herself to do that. Her upbringing on a hippie commune taught her to be kind to the powerless, but her psychic abilities make her more vulnerable than she realizes.
As you can imagine, the books are quite dissimilar in tone. Swoon is a typical supernatural romance with a Byronic hero. Girls who like sparkly vampires will most likely be pleased with it. Readers who think Jane Eyre should never have returned to that would-be polygamist, Mr. Rochester, should probably stay away.
Bliss is classic
horror, but it has elements that transcend the genre. Myracle weaves social and
historical commentary into the book by setting it in
*The last book I reviewed actually meets this criterion too. What’s with the one-word trend? Perhaps it’s all a plot hatched by SWINTON.