Ruined by Paula Morris

'Ruined' has a cover that makes you want to jump right into the pages, and the summary on the jacket does the same. How could you go wrong when the books about the mystical side of the historic and tradition rich New Orleans. This book promises ghosts, voodoo, curses and hauntings. It promises these things yet gives them too you far too late. I kept reading and reading hoping to get to the good stuff but it truly didn't show up until the last 75 pages. The main character Rebecca is a teenager forced to move to New Orleans to live with her 'Aunt' whom she's only met once. She's a New Yorker who wants very little to do with the traditions of a city like New Orleans. She doesn't believe in the voodoo and curses that are talked about constantly. That is until she meets a ghost in the local cemetery and she's the only person who can see her. Okay, so here's the point where I thought "yes, here we go, now we're gonna get the good stuff." I was wrong. 225 pages of words that didn't bring the excitement I was hoping for. Morris tiptoes around what should be the best part of the book, the ghost and why can Rebecca see her and no one else can. I kept reading and reading and reading. Finally at the last 75 or so pages we're satisfied and get some good stuff, but frankly there's a lot of pages of stuff we just didn't need. I'm more than disturbed to find that author is a teacher of creative writing at a university. This should mean she's a master at structure, form and plots. But she really makes me question the University system. The book was, for the most part boring and long winded. The end was great but there was way too many pages of stuff that just wasn't good. Teen Book Crack suggests that maybe you walk by this beautiful cover and grab something else.


** stars out of *****