Marked by P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast

This is the first book in the House of Night series which chronicles the adventures of Zoey Redbird as she attends the boarding school for fledging vampires. As the novel opens Zoey is just a young teenage girl. She goes to school, dates the school quarterback, and gossips with her friends. There is a deeper side to her though. Her home life is far from perfect, with a demeaning and controlling step-father. Her one place she can be herself is with her grandmother, who owns a lavender farm and is part Native American. Zoey’s Cherokee heritage plays a big part in the novel and helps her overcome obstacles later on in the book.
Life changes for Zoey when she becomes marked as a fledging vampire. This happens one day after school and instantaneously a quarter moon tattoo appears on her forehead. This has happened before at school and always with ridicule for those who have been marked. But what is worse is that she knows that her step-father, who is extremely conservative, will totally freak out. She eventually makes it to her grandmother’s farm, all while getting increasingly sick. Those who have been marked become allergic to sunlight and will eventually die unless they make lifestyle changes. Zoey doesn’t find her grandmother on the farm, and ends up collapsing on a cliff. In her exhaustion she receives a vision of the vampire goddess, Nyx, who claims Zoey as one of her own and blesses her, and implies great things for Zoey’s future.

Fortunately for Zoey her grandmother finds her and delivers her to the House of Night. Most of the novel is spent introducing Zoey (and us the readers) to a new and different world. She quickly makes friends and gets used to going to classes at night. One major difference between vampire school and regular school is that at any moment a person’s body could reject the vampire mark, which causes them to die. And on top of this she has become enemy number one for the most popular girl in school, Aphrodite, a high priestess in training and leader of the Dark Daughters, an after school club for the most elite fledging vampires. Zoey has to rely on her heritage, her friends, and her faith in order to succeed.

I liked a lot of this book, but I disliked a lot of it too. Overall I thought it was pretty ingenious and a good mash-up of vampires and school drama. On the other hand it was very obvious that this is the first book in a series, as it is fairly light on plot (until the last 60 pages or so), and relies a lot on introducing readers to the life of a young vampire. This novel also wears its YA-ness in its sleeve. Some of the supporting characters intentionally use big words, only to have other characters define them for Zoey and the reader. (Honestly, Zoey is so worldly it surprises me that she has a rather limited vocabulary.) I do like the fact that it isn’t afraid to broach the subjects of sex and drugs, but again it goes out of its way to make sure that readers know that Zoey doesn’t do those sorts of things and in fact frowns upon them. I don’t mind the lesson in morality per se, but rather I dislike the ham handedness of it. The book at times seems to be trying to hard to be relevant to teens, instead of just telling a good story. That being said, this series is quite popular. I would recommend this book for younger girls (eighth grade and up) who have an open mind and are not put off with the frank discussions of sex, drugs, and the occasional swear word and with one caveat: Marked is great when it’s telling its story, but falls flat when it over reaches for relevance.