Devilish Review

I love to read but since I've been under a lot of stress lately my mind is only interested in reading light stuff. No Stephen King, nothing with too much of a plot or too many characters. Because of this I've been turning to the young adult section during my weekly visits to my city's Bookmobile. Last week when I stepped aboard to see what was new I was drawn to a book titled Devilish by Maureen Johnson as it had a yummy looking pink cupcake on the front cover and the title sounded good so I grabbed it.

Devilish is about Jane Jarvis who is a smart, sassy Juno kind of character who goes to a private school for girls in Providence, RI with her best friend, Ally. They are both average students who don't really stand out for any reason but wish they did. A few days after Ally experiences an intensely embarassing and mortifying incident at school, she returns and is all of a sudden cool, stylishly dressed, confident, and dripping with friends. Turns out that Ally has sold her soul to a demon in exchange for the newfound popularity. Jane takes it upon herself to rescue Ally from her ultimate demise and all sorts of odd things happen.

Devilish turned out to be a really good read. It's about 250 of very fast and interesting reading with pretty good character development. I ripped thru it in just a few hours one day and thoroughly enjoyed the diversion, unique plot, unexpected character twists, and the creative demerits the nuns hand out in the hallways (i.e., Sister Rose gives Jane a demerit for "lack of caution in adverse conditions" when Jane is caught running thru the hallways during a power outage).

4 stars - Devilish was very enjoyable and skyrocketed to one of the top positions of my favorite young adult books. Amazon states that Devilish is appropriate for grades 8-11 and I agree. I don't recall any swearing or sexual situations but the demon subject matter may freak out younger kids.