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A review by wjreadsbooks
Impossible by Nancy Werlin
2.0
Before this I've previously read [b:Extraordinary|7456034|Extraordinary|Nancy Werlin|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1341193984s/7456034.jpg|9504970] Extraordinary before this book, so I've got a good idea about how Werlin would incorporate the fantasy elements into the novel. As usual Werlin's created a pretty captivating story at the heart of the novel, although I haven't heard of the "Scarborough Fair" before this novel. Essentially the folk ballad tells of three impossible tasks that a woman has to accomplish. Impossible uses the tasks mentioned in the ballad to refer to the tasks that the Scarborough women have to do in order to escape a curse placed on the family.
The Scarborough women are destined to become pregnant at eighteen and to have a daughter. Each time after the daughter is born, her mother appears to go insane after the birth. All these started because Fenella Scarborough, their ancestress, had rejected a elf lord of some sort. The lord, furious at the rejection, placed the curse over the family and all the women in her family have succumbed to it. Lucy is the latest in the family and she's just about to turn eighteen. However her situation is rather different because she's got support from her adopted family as well as Zac, the boy next door who's known her for just about forever.
I was really interested in finding out Lucy was going to complete the tasks because at first glance, the tasks really seemed (for a lack of a better word) impossible. The first chapter hooked me right in, with Lucy discovering her birth-mother's (Miranda's) letter but being too young to understand what the letter means. The next chapters are all about Lucy at seventeen, wanting to go to prom and helping to deal with her friend's boy troubles. Things change later on when Zach returns and a stranger comes to their town. That's when things get really interesting and everything starts to happen...
One of the elements that I really enjoyed were the family dynamics between Lucy and her foster parents, Soledad and Leo. I loved the way they supported her even though they didn't always agree with her decisions and how they just cared for her. Soledad, especially, shone. She's the best foster mother ever and I liked hearing about the relationship between Miranda and Soledad as well. The descriptions about the methodological way their family decided to approach the curse was cool too and I liked how everyone chipped in to help figure out how to complete the tasks.
HOWEVER, there were some major problems with the book that marred the good parts of the novel. A BIG issue was how I wasn't comfortable with using rape as a plot device. Pradraig Seeley's curse is such that the women in the family would get pregnant but it really said nothing at all about rape. The romance in the book seemed rather odd and ill-fitting as well. I get that Zach Greenfield is a good guy and that he's willing to do the upright thing and marry Lucy and all. But honestly a teen pregnancy and marriage seems a lot for a book to squeeze in and it really stretches the imagination to believe that all that would happen in the course of nine months. There was also a throwaway line that bothered me about how Lucy's gynaecologist was conservative and was pleased when he heard that she was married--what was up with that? Why did Werlin even add that in? It seemed so strange.
On the whole I would say that I did find the book to be compelling, although the ending was too pat and not all that satisfying. However the weird problems (as mentioned earlier) really stuck out and left me not knowing what the heck I was supposed to feel.
The Scarborough women are destined to become pregnant at eighteen and to have a daughter. Each time after the daughter is born, her mother appears to go insane after the birth. All these started because Fenella Scarborough, their ancestress, had rejected a elf lord of some sort. The lord, furious at the rejection, placed the curse over the family and all the women in her family have succumbed to it. Lucy is the latest in the family and she's just about to turn eighteen. However her situation is rather different because she's got support from her adopted family as well as Zac, the boy next door who's known her for just about forever.
I was really interested in finding out Lucy was going to complete the tasks because at first glance, the tasks really seemed (for a lack of a better word) impossible. The first chapter hooked me right in, with Lucy discovering her birth-mother's (Miranda's) letter but being too young to understand what the letter means. The next chapters are all about Lucy at seventeen, wanting to go to prom and helping to deal with her friend's boy troubles. Things change later on when Zach returns and a stranger comes to their town. That's when things get really interesting and everything starts to happen...
One of the elements that I really enjoyed were the family dynamics between Lucy and her foster parents, Soledad and Leo. I loved the way they supported her even though they didn't always agree with her decisions and how they just cared for her. Soledad, especially, shone. She's the best foster mother ever and I liked hearing about the relationship between Miranda and Soledad as well. The descriptions about the methodological way their family decided to approach the curse was cool too and I liked how everyone chipped in to help figure out how to complete the tasks.
HOWEVER, there were some major problems with the book that marred the good parts of the novel. A BIG issue was how I wasn't comfortable with using rape as a plot device. Pradraig Seeley's curse is such that the women in the family would get pregnant but it really said nothing at all about rape. The romance in the book seemed rather odd and ill-fitting as well. I get that Zach Greenfield is a good guy and that he's willing to do the upright thing and marry Lucy and all. But honestly a teen pregnancy and marriage seems a lot for a book to squeeze in and it really stretches the imagination to believe that all that would happen in the course of nine months. There was also a throwaway line that bothered me about how Lucy's gynaecologist was conservative and was pleased when he heard that she was married--what was up with that? Why did Werlin even add that in? It seemed so strange.
On the whole I would say that I did find the book to be compelling, although the ending was too pat and not all that satisfying. However the weird problems (as mentioned earlier) really stuck out and left me not knowing what the heck I was supposed to feel.