Mortal Danger: The Immortal Game, Book 1

The premise of MORTAL DANGER will make readers pick up the book. Readers will want to see how Edie exacts her revenge on the people who have tormented her throughout high school. However, author Ann Aguirre fails to make Edie a sympathetic character by not showing readers at the beginning of the novel how she was bullied and making us root for her and dislike her tormentors. Readers may groan at the way Edie wants to exact her revenge -- by becoming beautiful so she can infiltrate the group of beautiful people who hurt her. Once Edie becomes beautiful, she suddenly -- and implausibly -- gains self-confidence, poise, and cattiness she never had before and inexplicably befriends some of her bullies. They're actually kind of nice, while Edie's the one making cruel comments. As for Kian, the insta-love interest, Edie starts kissing him shortly after meeting him and abandons all logic due to her love for him. Thrown into the mix is a supernatural game between warring monster groups, as well as the Japanese gang the Yakuza, while the revenge plot goes out the window and the book becomes more about supernatural agencies, urban legends, and creepy monsters than bullying.

Mortal Danger does have some good points, such as Edie being a good friend and daughter. But the plot is very confusing, with everything but the kitchen sink thrown in. It would have been more interesting had the author dug deeper into bullying and how, through Edie's own devices, things start to unravel.