Review: Incarnate by Jodi Meadow

Pages: 234
Format: e-book
Genre: Fantasy, Romance
Published January 31, 2012 by Harper Collins
Goodreads // Amazon

New soul
Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.
No soul
Even Ana's own mother thinks she's a nosoul, an omen of worse things to come, and has kept her away from society. To escape her seclusion and learn whether she'll be reincarnated, Ana travels to the city of Heart, but its citizens are afraid of what her presence means. When dragons and sylph attack the city, is Ana to blame?
Heart
Sam believes Ana's new soul is good and worthwhile. When he stands up for her, their relationship blooms. But can he love someone who may live only once, and will Ana's enemies--human and creature alike--let them be together? Ana needs to uncover the mistake that gave her someone else's life, but will her quest threaten the peace of Heart and destroy the promise of reincarnation for all?

The beginning of this book was rather confusing to me, and to be honest, I didn't enjoy it so much. I didn't understand why Sam would just take Ana in for weeks without question. I kept wondering what was in it for him because in the beginning Ana had some real self-worth problems and was rather doom and gloom. He quickly becomes rather possessive over her because she's something new and interesting. For some reason, I couldn't help thinking that he acted rather like Edward Cullen. He even wrote her own song for her on the piano.

Halfway through the book, after Ana accepts herself, the book actually gets interesting! I'm still rather dubious about Sam and his motivation for falling head over heels so quickly for her, but I start to accept that they have a relationship. Things get exciting once it becomes clear that Ana is in danger, as many people think she is an omen of the end of reincarnation. We learn quite a bit more and the ending had me turning the pages enraptured. There were dragon attacks! That was so awesome!

Jodi Meadows isn't a perfect writer. Some of the plot had technical issues for me, but I have to give her credit for being so original! Also, that girl used tons of words that I had assumed were quite advanced for Young Adult books and she made the descriptions in her book so intelligent rather than average. Kudos for that.

It's really up in the air whether I'll read more of the series, though it does somehow leave me wanting more. How does a book that I feel so hot and cold over do that to me? Overall, if you like the twilight-esque romance (or obsession) that seems to develop rather too quickly, this book is for you! Also, I can't ignore the fact that if someone finds the premise of souls reincarnating fascinating then this book will actually be as interesting as it promises. It will be.