Pure by Terra Elan McVoy

[description from Amazon]

Tabitha and her four best friends all wear Purity Rings, symbols of the virginity-until-marriage pledge they made as tweens. Now the girls are fifteen, and their rings have come to symbolize not only their purity, but also the friendships and identities they've built based on their shared faith. Simmering tensions rise to the surface and the group is split apart when one of Tab's friends admits that she and her long-term boyfriend have broken the pledge. In the midst of the confrontations, betrayals, confessions, and revenge that follow, each girl is forced to reexamine her friendships, her faith, and what exactly it means to be pure.

Review:

This book could have been really bad. It could have easily become preachy and obnoxious, like my religion textbook last semester.* There were a few places where A LOT of religion talk was, but other than that, the book doesn't overkill with religion. Religion is dealt with in an almost respectable way; it's mentioned, it's practiced, it's talked about, it's treated as good, but it isn't dealt with in depth. But even though the book isn't obnoxious and preachy and bad, it's still not GREAT either. It's good. Above average, but not great.

The book was slow to start. The description reveals that someone broke the purity pledge, but it's not revealed until about 1/4 into the book. For the first 80ish pages, I was just waiting for it to be revealed so the plot could start moving. The plot did pick up after the pledge breaker was revealed, but then the plot kind of went up and down in terms of excitement. Morgan, Tabitha's ultra-religious best friend, is kind disgusted by the pledge-breaker, and she is very vocal about her disgust. There was that to help the plot move along, as well as Tabitha's new love interest and her trying to help her pledge-break friend, but that's about it. There was a lot of build up to the bigger events, which did make those events more exciting, but didn't really help the rest of the book.

I enjoyed the characterization a lot, though Tabitha does come off a bit too perfect. Her friends are refreshingly realistic and distinct. It's easy to see what they're all really like, especially after someone breaks the pledge. Most of them grew a lot during the novel, but they didn't grow so much that they weren't finished thinking. There was one particularly annoying exception to this well-developed friend thing, and that is Priah, one of the five friends. She wasn't in the book very much and only really provided more stress for Tabitha.

And this may be just me, but I appreciated the portrayals of the different Christians in the book, because Tabitha is a normal, sane Christian, Morgan is a little nuts but grows, and there were other characters who were conflicted about their beliefs. Normally I have to deal with kooky religious people or people who say they're religious but are not at all,** so it was nice to see people who actually meant what they said but were relatively normal.

Pure is a realistic, thought-provoking book that could use a few improvements, but still makes an enjoyable read.

7.5/10

*You should have seen my religion book last semester. SO MANY EXCLAMATION POINTS. I think the book is still in my locker, actually. I should bring it home and show you all examples of its crazyness.
**I went to a private middle school and currently attend a Catholic high school. I'm well acquainted with "religious" teenagers.