Obsidian, by Jennifer L. Armentrout, will take you on a whirlwind of puke-worthy clichés.

Add an awkward girl, a desolate town and supernatural beings and you have a spinoff of Stephenie Meyer’s (in)famous quadrilogy. If it doesn’t scream Twilight, then I don’t know what will.

Honestly, I get that the main female is supposed to be an awkward, insecure teen who lacks in the social department – that was clear from the first word – but the author asserts it a smidge too much. There is literally a whole chapter just for introducing Katy, even though it is obvious what kind of character she will be, because she follows the ugly duckling cliché, where she herself thinks she’s ugly but the love interest sweeps her off her feet and tells her she’s actually beautiful. For Pete’s sake, she even has her own blog, “Katy’s Krazy Obsession,” and it gets awkward for the reader from there.

The unnecessary periodic mention of this blog is an attempt to further label Katy as a bookworm and indoor enthusiast, but doesn’t significantly contribute to the book as a whole, or even the development of her character. These way-too-obvious signs of her character overwhelms the reader, and discourages them to stop reading right off the bat.

Let’s not forget about the too-hot-to-be-true supernatural being cliché. With a description not modest enough (or at all, I should say) for only a 17 year old, right off the bat everything about him ticked me off. While Katy got an unnecessary chapter, Daemon got considerably less, thank goodness, but it still seems too stretched out, ramblings about buff muscles and a perfectly chiseled face, and jeans hung low, and, oh not to forget, on top of all of that he just happened to be shirtless (which cues another rambling about his sculpted abs from the gods). Surprise, surprise, Daemon turns out to be the biggest jerk in the world.

Katy’s and Daemon’s encounter was more annoying than mosquitoes in the summer, she couldn’t stop ogling his unnaturally ripped body, and he couldn’t stop smirking and holding an air of cockiness for more than two seconds. Great, off to a great start with the book (assuming you survived the whole first chapter dedicated to Katy). If you’re gonna write a cheesy novel for hopeless romantics, might as well push the cliché the whole nine yards.

Daemon and Katy, as individual characters, are bad enough; but together, especially as love interests, is a recipe for disaster. Daemon is suppose to be a conceited, arrogant jerk but all too soon, he abruptly goes through a complete character change and actually shows affection for Katy.

Yes, we all saw this coming, but diving straight into a love confession consisting of typical bad-boy pick-up lines, such as “You’re the only one for me,” is a self-proclaimed crime. One moment he would harass and make fun of Katy, and then the next moment slip something along the lines of, “You’re the most beautiful girl I have ever met.” This interrupts the plotline and prevents it from flowing smoothly in order to get their love properly flowing. Well, it was doomed from the start.

Katy, being the desperate and despicable ogling teen she is, has her fair share of cheesy dialogue (fantastic, there’s more…). She literally never talks about anything other than, “Daemon is so hot, hot, hot,” and that keeps spewing out of her mouth every second. It gets worse. Everytime Daemon shows a slight interest in her or touches her in any way, the first thing she thinks of is how sparks fly through her body or how her skin tingles through her clothes. Puke.

This mumbled-jumbled mess of a novel makes an absolute fail of a possibly effective story. It is  anticlimactic, and every insignificant event is stretched out to an endless number of pages. It lacks a crucial amount of authenticity and excitement. For your mental health (because this book makes you want to rip your eyes out), please take one good look at the cheesy cover, and put it back on the shelf.