Into the Fallen

So we are all at this point pretty familiar with the witches, vampires and werewolves variety of this particular theme. However, a new spin on this genre of which I became aware when I began this project was the fallen angel category. My first instinct was to be a little wary of this kind. We can all see the appeal of the others. Dark, brooding monster-like figures who are really good at heart and are simply misunderstood. Right? But when you are dealing with fallen angels, doesn't that imply a willingness to be dark? How can these figures be redeemed? That is what I wanted to know when beginning to explore these types, and I started by reading the first two books in a series by Thomas Sniegoski. Here is what I found:

Title: Fallen
Leviathan
Author: Thomas Sniegoski
My reading dates, respectively: 11/8/10-11/10/10
11/11/10-11/11/10
Book counts: 70, 71

So, in this particular case, the answer to how these characters can be redeemable lies in the fact that they are not actually full fallen angels. The main character is half human, half (fallen) angel, representing a biblical race called the Nephilim. Yep, they are in there, you can check. Genesis 6 amoung other places. And I believe I referenced this particular mystery when reviewing some of the other biblical fiction works in the past. They are referenced, but debate rages on today about exactly who the Nephilim are supposed to be, or what they are supposed to be, perhaps. Which is convenient for fiction because it allows some room to maneuver, which is what Sniegoski did when he made them his central theme.

The hero of our story discovers on his 18th birthday that he suddenly has a lot of cool new talents, including the spontaneous ability to understand and speak any language. Man, I wish I had that talent! Anyway, it follows that he is tracked down by other fallen angels and they explain who he is. However, to make life a little more troublesome for our hero, it turns out that another group of very angry angels has been tasked with the job of killing off these undesirable products of the angels' sins, and thus he must flee, or occasionally try to fight, some pretty powerful heavenly hosts. Meanwhile, the most popular girl in school suddenly loves him and what should a boy do in all of this chaos?

The first book in the series was fine. It would find a better audience amoung teenage boys than twenty-something females. This is in itself a good thing, as there just doesn't seem to be as much out there to get teenage guys reading, so even if it is somewhat weak, I will take it. But the fact remains that it is a little weak. The hero is likeable enough, but the peripheral characters are pretty basic. The best redeeming feature is the talking dog. The dog kept me going through the pages, I'm not going to lie. But then, talking dogs will only get you so far.

The series really starts to fall apart already in the second novel. While the first had some undeveloped potential, the second goes off in a very bizarre direction involving weird little body snatching monsters and other science fiction-y type things that were just not my style. But again, if you are a teenage boy, maybe....? They really lost me when they revealed that one of the most powerful archangels has been trapped in a monster's stomach for centuries and the hero had to save him. Seriously??

I will note that my research dug up the fact that this series was briefly a television series. And I was almost lured to try to find it when I found that the lead was played by Paul Wesley, more recently famous as Stefan Salvatore on The Vampire Diaries. TVD has been perhaps one of the best things that has come of this little reading project of mine. However, the mini-series inspired by Sniegowski's "The Fallen" was cancelled after only a few episodes, which left me wondering...
(UPDATE: Ok, ok, so ended up buying it. All of it. And I have to admit that, while the books were pretty mediocre, the screed adaptation was actually pretty fun to watch. This stems from a combination of some good rewriting in cleaning up the plotlines and the fact that Paul Wesley just really is a truly talented actor. Also, if you watch it, tell me I am not crazy and that the background music in the little opening slides in which they explain the Fallen ones sounds at least a LITTLE like the song "Black and Yellow". Now everytime I hear that song I can't help but think of "Fallen")
Anyway, so far the fallen angel angle of this genre is not so much winning me over. Hmmm. Continuing on...

Grade for this series: C, it was just average.
Would adults be interested? Probably not.

Ok, and now for something completely different...
Keep reading!
Sarah