[Review] The Casquette Girls by Alys Arden

The Casquette Girls by Alys Arden

Rating: 4 stars

Series: The Casquette Girls #1

Version: NetGalley E-ARC

Release Date: November 17th 2015

 Goodreads Synopsis:
Seven girls tied by time.Five powers that bind.One curse to lock the horror away.One attic to keep the monsters at bay.
After the storm of the century rips apart New Orleans, sixteen-year-old Adele Le Moyne wants nothing more than her now silent city to return to normal. But with home resembling a war zone, a parish-wide curfew, and mysterious new faces lurking in the abandoned French Quarter, normalneeds a new definition. 
As the city murder rate soars, Adele finds herself tangled in a web of magic that weaves back to her own ancestors. Caught in a hurricane of myths and monsters, who can she trust when everyone has a secret and keeping them can mean life or death? Unless . . . you’re immortal.

 I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Alys Arden crafted an intricate, mysterious read (and it would have been perfect for Halloween, but I'm a month late on that) that takes place in the heart of the French Quarter of New Orleans (or should I say La Nouvelle-Orléans?). This charming story incorporates witches, magic, mayhem, vampires, voodoo, and much more into the historical founding of the city, and the French words here and there only add to the authenticity - New Orleans seems like a magical place! 

To add to the magic, I thought, after reading it, it was a mix of The Princess and The Frog and Halloweentown (both Disney movies)! 

 The story itself has a slow start, introducing Adele and her father and the rest of our cast of characters, and how they managed to cope and move past The Storm that damaged their city. For the first two hundred pages or so, I will emphasize that it was slow. I did wonder for awhile where Arden was going with the story, because within the main plot, there was a bunch of smaller plots, and even smaller details imbedded in these plots that made me backtrack when these details were put to use, because I didn't remember when/what exactly happened. There's Adele whole discovery of the attic, and her newfound powers. There's her meeting Isaac. Meeting Niccolo and Gabriel. Going to Sacred Heart Academy, the rich preppy school. Trying to stand Desiree, the mayor's daughter who is at first very snobbish. Just going to input this here, but if The Casquette Girls was a movie, I was picturing Rihanna as Desiree the whole time. I don't know why, but Desiree was my favorite character, with her sassy fierceness.

Fire, fire, toil and trouble!

Back to the point, for the first half of the book there was a lot of detail and characters and nothing really began until halfway through, and that's when everything got really cool. Now it turned into a "we're descended from a coven of witches and we've got to stop the vampires" plot. Totally unlike Twilight, if that's what you're thinking. The vampires, while attractive, did not sparkle. They weren't entirely evil. It was actually interesting that after Adele found out about -insert vampire here-, they had a whole chat about it, no fangs (hehe) barred. There was no Bella. And it was a nice touch of Arden to have a coven that wasn't entirely full of girls.

The backstory with the original coven was also my favorite part; you get to see Isaac, Adele, and Desiree's great-great-great-something grandmothers' and the rest of the girls come together and ensnare some vampires. Not all witches are the same - Corsette had the powers of seduction, Scarlet had the powers of wind, etc.

And the twists - There were a ton of twists! I didn't expect a lot of them, or any of them for that matter. The very small details in the beginning of the book have a role here, so pay attention!

But with all the twists and revelations, there are still so many questions. Are there any descendants left of the original coven? What happens to Adele's mom? What now? Hopefully this gets covered in the sequel!

If you're usually wary of vampire books because of the cliches and the sparkles, don't fear, The Casquette Girls gives a New Orleans take of vampires and witches, complete with the allure, the magic, the French language, and of course, the voodoo.