Thirteen Days to Midnight

Thirteen Days to Midnight is another one by Patrick Carmen. 
       Jacob Fielding's adoptive parent, Mr. Fielding has just died in a car crash.  The last words he ever said to Jacob were 'You are indestructable'.  And then he died.  Jacob must shove aside his guilt, though, his guilt of something he hopes to never tell anyone, and go to school, acting like everything is normal.  And then he meets a girl, Ophelia James, or Oh, a girl who likes to do crazy and dangerous things.  On the cast she received from falling down on her longboard, he writes the words Mr. Fielding told him 'You are indestructable'.  It seems an appropriate thing to tell a good-looking girl who has just broken their arms--reassuring and philosophical. And maybe cool. 
       But a few minutes later, Oh gets into a crash that should've ruined her life.  Miraculously she gets up, unharmed.  But what is this strange phenomenon?  What is the secret of the power Jacob, Oh, and their friend Milo, will come to call the diamond? And how far will the two boys go to save the life of a girl they met only thirteen days ago -- are they willing to kill her? 

I have to admit, Thirteen Days to Midnight isn't as good as I was hoping.  In other words, it wasn't as disturbing as Dark Eden.  It does not give me the chills every time I think about it.  (But maybe that's because I flipped to the end. I don't know.) 
     Really, I don't know what Jacob sees in Oh.  He only knew her for, like, forty-eight hours, if that, before she became possessed.  But, I guess she has a good heart, until the end. Then she sort of gets . . . creepy.  Never mind, I do get chills.   Also, sometimes I had to go back and look at the sentences again.  I read very quickly, so sometimes I read "Oh, said she'd meet me there,"  when it really said, "Oh said she'd meet me there."  But Patrick Carmen tried to make her seem multi-layered, maybe a seven-layer girl with plenty of secrets, but I can only find three layers and secrets that aren't so secret.
      Jacob, well, I sort of figured out his guilt trip before he said it, because a lot of clues are dropped.(And no, I did not figure it out by reading ahead.)  Also, you only learn just enough about his life before and with Mr. Fielding to make him seem human, something with a past.  He does seem to be many-layered, only if the view is first person and there is always that niggling suspicion that he isn't admitting everything, even to himself.
      Milo is the one character who is as sturdy as a block.  You don't really learn too much about him either.  He was the second-best-thought-out character, in my opinion, behind Jacob.  Oh is just there to be a pretty girl and provide conflict, but even though Milo can seem to be an afterthought sometimes he is still always there and there is something . . . good about that.  Because even though the plot twists violently, there is always someone who is only slightly changed by the ordeal.
      As I said, the plot twists violently, but it is a well-thought out plot.  Sure, the diamond thing doesn't make too much sense to me, but who am I to judge?  Anyway, it is a dark enough power to threaten our heroes and their heroine, and it does it's job well.  It doesn't throw me into a panic, though, only them.  Does that make any sense?  Ok, let's put it this way:  You don't feel the danger as the characters do because you saw it coming from a mile off.  So, what if you're an avid fantasy reader and can see every twist and turn coming around the corner?  It still ruins the surprise. 
     Patrick Carmen might not have gone to great lengths to make the world of Jacob Fielding vibrant, but he succeeds.  The back story of Holy Crosses seems real, and the descriptions of the retired priests and the 'normal' teachers, the teachers who have other lives, really hit me in the gut.  Their rivalry with the opposing high school seems real too, like something you would read about in the newspaper. 
       All in all, I thought the book was pretty good. Sure, there were some things that could've been made better, but maybe I was reading it too fast.  It was a pretty fast paced book.  And if you're into science-fiction/alternative heroes this is the thing for you.