Review: Nightbird

Title: Nightbird

Author: Alice Hoffman

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy

Published: March 10, 2015

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Twig lived in a small town called Sidwell. There was a monster stealing little things from people in town, leaving blue graffiti, and briefly being sighted. Twigs family had a secret of their own and a fear it would be found out.

With the amount of time it took to be introduced to Twig I was surprised the rest of the story wasn't more involved. Once we got to know all the characters the story moved very quickly. The big reveals (the family secret, the reason the witch cursed her family, and how everyone was interconnected) were not as surprising as they should have been. When each secret came to light instead of a gasp of surprise I thought, okay and...

My main problem with these people were their tendency to avoid conflict. Instead of confronting or dealing when issues came up they would leave. One character after another left. Even Twig who was twelve would run away if she thought someone was going to say something she didn't like. Really they needed to all just sit down and talk things through. It wouldn't have solved all the problems within the story, but it would have been a lot less psychologically frustrating.

I am a person who likes happy endings, in fact I prefer them. This one however, I felt as if I had been tossed into a vat of cotton candy and told to make my way out by eating. I could almost feel the sugar shock hitting me as I pushed through. Everything was rapped up nice and neat. Every character was beyond happy and things in their world could not have been better. It was really saccharine sweet.

Overall I gave this book 3 stars out of 5.