White Cat by Holly Black

White Cat
(Curse Workers, #1)
by Holly Black
Released |May 4th 2010 by Margaret K. McElderry Books|
Edition |Audio|
Source |Library|
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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 criminals. Many become mobsters and con artists. But not Cassel. He hasn't got magic, 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.
Cassel has carefully built up a facade of normalcy, blending into the crowd. But his facade starts to crumble when he finds himself 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. As Cassel begins to suspect he's part of a huge con game, he must unravel his past and his memories. To find out the truth, Cassel will have to out-con the conmen.

I don't really know how to describe my thoughts on White Cat. This is the first book that I've read by the author and I listened to the audio. The audio was interesting since I haven't listened to too many that was read by a male. The book itself was okay. I enjoyed it, but it took me awhile to get into the actual story of the book. I really liked the idea of the curse workers. It was like a new take on witches, but all the magic was done with the touch of a finger. Overall, I enjoyed the book and will definitely pick up the second from the library soon :)


As stated before, I couldn't get into the story until I got 2/6 parts through the book. I think it was a mix of not being use to listening to a male reading on an audio book and just the book in general. But after awhile things got pretty interested in the story and I was curious to know about the characters and the curse workers. Cassel, the main character, was very interesting. He wanted to be all these things, but couldn't because he was told all his life that he was the only one in his family who was not a worker. I liked Cassel, but he was one of those strange characters that you really have to get use to. His way of thinking is definitely different and he can be a true con artist. But he grew on me and I really came to like him. Cassel found out that he was losing his memory. Someone was stealing his memories and replacing them with new ones. Horrible right?! And then we had his weird brothers who I did not like one bit. But I never really grew to like Lila. I didn't understand her and I also felt that her character was a tad bit under develop when things came to the light. I still feel as though I don't know her at all.

I will say that this book had a good bit of action in it. All the conning and scheming made the book very interesting. Romance wise, I wasn't really feeling it. Maybe in book 2, I will like it a bit more. I mean, there wasn't much of it to begin with, but the parts that was there I didn't really like it. I'm curious to see what happens in book 2 so I will definitely continue on.