Review: Hush Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick

I have a confession to make. When I picked this book off my pile of review books my heart sunk. First off, I’d scanned the promotional material and knew it was yet another high school teenager falls for inappropriate male story. Then there was the small matter of the black feather that had fallen out of the envelope that accompanied the promotional material. So, there was no doubt about it. I wasn’t going to enjoy this.

Yeah, well, OK.

Approximately 150 pages in and I had to put it down because the kids were screaming to be fed, and that’s pretty much how it carried on until I had reached the final page.

So what makes Hush Hush worth reading?  To start with, there’s the two lead characters. Leaving aside the problem of their names (Nora and Patch! I ask you. Those names might work in the US but in England I have an image of a decrepit and irritable old woman getting down with the dog. But I digress), these two are as well-drawn and attractive as any. Nora is a feisty number. She is self-reliant and not easily spooked and no one could be more surprised than she when she finds herself drawn towards the mysterious new boy at school. Indeed, she refuses to give in to the inevitable, does her utmost to avoid Patch and even starts dating another boy, until she comes to suspect that he may have been involved in the death of another girl.  All of which makes the final submission to Patch all the more convincing.

Patch, too is a multi-dimensional creation, no mean feat given he’s the supernatural one. He remains difficult to read, right up to the end. Yes, he’s the fallen angel and yes, he fell, we learn, for all the right reasons. But there are hints a many of the evil he has perpetrated in the past and neither Nora nor the reader can be sure that in the end the evil side of his nature will not triumph.

And then we come to the writing style. This is lean and pacy and dominated by sassy and believable dialogue. Hush Hush is a book you can read quickly, indeed that you want to read quickly. It’s fun and exciting, intriguing and not a little bit sexy; it’s a different twist on the high school romance and a stupendous first novel.

I gather Becca Fitzpatrick is now working on a sequel.  I won’t be picking that one up with a sinking heart, but I do hope I don’t get another black feather.

Hush Hush by Becca Fitzpartick, published by Simon & Schuster, October 29^th 2009