This one was touted a little more as a romance (I know, surprising since that is not the vibe you get from the cover) so I was reading it mostly to see what sort of genre stickers should be placed on it for shelving purposes. Boy, am I glad I read it because I couldn't put it down.

Ethan Wate is 16 years old and growing up in Gatlin, a very small town in the South. The community is filled with pride for the Confederacy and places a lot of value in history and they way things have always been. The DAR and other historical organizations hold a great deal of sway. So, folks are less than thrilled with the arrival of Lena Duchanne. Besides not wanting to fit the stereotype of the local cheerleader, she is also the niece of Macon Ravenwood, who has been a hermit hidden away in the town's only remaining plantation house. While the Ravenwoods are the oldest family in Gatlin, people are put off by his reclusiveness and the fact that he has allowed the estate to become rundown, looking more like a haunted house than a sign of wealth. You can only guess the kind of rumors that circulate as a result.

As Lena and Ethan become friends, they start to realize that they have an eerie connection. They are able to share thoughts, allowing for secret conversations, but they also seem to have been sharing dreams for months, even before Lena's arrival in town. The dreams are full of fire and seem to be representing events that took placed decades earlier during the War Between the States, or the War for Southern Independence as locals refer to it.

Lena eventually starts to trust Ethan enough to share the seceret that she is from a family of Casters, those who have special magical abilities that are a little bit psychic ability and a little bit witchcraft. Lena's life is getting more and more complicated as her own 16th birthday approaches because that is the night that her destiny will be chosen for her ... will she a Caster that favors the forces of Light or those of the Dark?

The books is an amazing mix of history (both regular and familial), character development, and action. In some ways it reminds me a lot of Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches series, but there is also a lot that makes it unique. The characters seem trapped in a world filled with high school cliques and decades old predictions that indicate the worst, but that doesn't stop Ethan and Lena from trying to find true happiness, particularly as their feelings for each other grow stronger and stronger.

Their romance nicely draws on the interest in those looking for stories like Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series, but this book is a lot more than a copycat title. For example, Ethan is still dealing with the loss of his mother, who died recently in an accident, and the effects her loss is having on the whole family.

On a really cool aside, the town librarian proves to be quite the interesting character who, in some ways, parallels Giles from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series in the fact that she knows a whole lot more than most people expect to find in the local library's collection.

This is a fun read, and it will hopefully be followed up with a great sequel.