Cassel comes from a family of curse workers -- people who have the power to change your emotions, your memories, your luck, by the slightest touch of their hands. And since curse work is illegal, they're all mobsters, or con artists. Except for Cassel. He hasn't got the magic touch, so he's an outsider, the straight kid in a crooked family. You just have to ignore one small detail -- he killed his best friend, Lila, three years ago.I am finally trying to get this blog caught up. I haven't felt like writing much or honestly reading too much either for the past few months. So I read White Cat quite awhile ago when it came out and I really liked it. I adore Holly Black's fairy series and have read them all several times so I was super excited to see such a different type of story from her.
Ever since, Cassel has carefully built up a façade of normalcy, blending into the crowd. But his façade starts crumbling when he starts sleepwalking, propelled into the night by terrifying dreams about a white cat that wants to tell him something. He's noticing other disturbing things, too, including the strange behavior of his two brothers. They are keeping secrets from him, caught up in a mysterious plot. As Cassel begins to suspect he's part of a huge con game, he also wonders what really happened to Lila. Could she still be alive? To find that out, Cassel will have to out-con the conmen.
I loved that White Cat was a mystery. I know Holly has said that she was drawing on noir and caper movies as inspiration and I love the effect that created. The word that always comes to mind with me for Holly's books is gritty. I enjoy them and think she is a great storyteller but they definitely aren't books that I would want to loan out to my younger book swapping friends. You know what that means, Nora, mature themes! ;)
My one issue with this book is that the ending is such a cliffhanger! I love and hate endings like that so much. I love them when I am reading a completed series and I can just jump right into the next book but I can't handle having to wait another year to pick up the story. I have zero patience for that. I have had too much waiting for the next book in a series stress lately what with the Kelley Armstrong books and then of course The Hunger Games. I am such a baby about stuff like this!
I thought this video was interesting:
