Beautiful Darkness and Entwined

I've read two YA chick-flicky books of late: Beautiful Darkness and Entwined.

My one beef with the former is that I can't hear the "male-ness" in the main character's voice. The book was written by two women, but the main character is a guy. While some authors manage to pull off opposite-gender main characters just fine, I simply can't settle into this guy's head. His emotionalness and descriptions are, for me, too feminine---and not just feminine, but womanly. Not that guys can't be emotional or poetic. I don't know. There's just something about both the first book (Beautiful Creatures) and this one that makes it hard for me to really grasp the main character. Still. The books are action-packed and pretty fun. The love triangle in this one, though, I have to say, I was rooting for this book's female version of Jacob. Poor me. :(

And Entwined. Ah, Entwined. Isn't the cover just gorgeous? As I said on Goodreads after I read this one, if I'd ever written a book, this would be it: an adaptation of the "Twelve Dancing Princesses" fairy tale. I actually did start trying to write this fairy tale into a book years ago, because as far as I knew then, it hadn't been done. Now it's been done at least three times over (i.e., Entwined and Princess of the Midnight Ball and Wildwood Dancing). I love the entrapment the author weaves---the girls' believable reasons for entering the enchanted wood to dance in the first place, and then their eventual entanglement there. I love that we get to see a relationship develop between the leading lady and her "prince." I love the gradual shift in the girls' relationship with their father. I just loved this book, but I'm kind of notorious for falling in love with fairy tale adaptations. What can I say, I was raised on Disney. :)