Good Cop, Bad Cop revision - March 2012 
 1. I only consider spoilers to be major plot reveals - some examples would be : a character death, who a girl chooses in a love triangle, or how a book ends. Random plot points do not count as spoilers to me, so please expect some in the review ahead. 
 2. Normally, I do not go into reviews looking to compare one book to another. The reason I was a bit more anal about comparisons for this book is because I have been burned before by another of this author's books. If you haven't read Half-Blood, then I would view This review first before proceeding any further with my review of Obsidian, so you will understand where my mind was at when I picked up this book. 
 And...start review over now. *original review* 
 3.5 stars. Long-ass review incoming where I'm about to play Good Cop, Bad Cop. 
 If you've read Armentrout by now (or heard of her in passing), chances are, you've heard of the gossip about her books being eerily similar to other series. Half-Blood felt like a partial re-write of the Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead, with a little bit of Percy Jackson by Rick Riordan mixed in. In the case of Obsidian, I'll be leaning toward Twilight meets I am Number Four. Now, I had heard the Twilight comparisons before, but not the one for I am Number Four, so if I'm echoing someone else's thoughts - sorry. It wasn't intentional. 
 When I had read somewhere that this book had some similarities to Twilight, my first thought was : not again...must we compare everything to this series? I'd say at least 75% of the Twilight comparisons are pretty weak arguments, most of them stretching pretty hard to find similarities. In the case of this book, I'm sorry to burst any hopeful bubbles...there were definitely some echoes here. 
 Some of these details might have been coincidental and not completely modeled on Twi, so please don't take all of it as hardcore comparison. 
 Bad Cop 
 1. Main characters hike to a special spot at a lake, described as bordering a magical meadow of flowers 
 2. The "aliens" all hang out together at school in a mysterious little clique (first seen as a group in the cafeteria *cough*), even though they're not all blood related. None of them have parents, but they're all held together by a father-like Carlisle figure. 
 3. Girl (Katy) is clumsy. The condition is not as pronounced as Bella's was, but she has her moments. 
 4. Girl is saved from an oncoming car nearly hitting her because the guy "revealed" his powers to her in order to save her. 
 5. Big chase scene near the end, where the girl runs off to a ballet studio errr remote area, in order to draw the bad guys away from her loved ones. 
 6. Alice The "twin" sister is peppy and clingy and wants to be around Katy non-stop. 
 7. Big "shopping with the girlfriends for dancewear scene." 
 8. Guy (Daemon) is perfect and can move at a super-fast speed. I'm actually going to give this one a pass. It was explained that the aliens could pick their skins when they came to earth, and you bet your ass I'd be picking to look pretty damn good myself if I had an option. The speed is explained due to the fact that all aliens can travel at the speed of light (they don't use ships, they use the light to get from place to place), so in this case, I don't think these details were borrowed. 
 In the case of "I am Number Four," this is more of an observation than a hard comparison, because the details were so minor : 
 I only saw the movie and the similarities are probably coincidental in this case. The major plot point of "Obsidian", where the good aliens came to earth to escape the bad aliens who were chasing them, sort of echoed what I remember. I also had "Roswell" flashbacks when it was described how the kids came to earth in groups of siblings, but again, this is probably coincidental. 
 You'd think after all this, I'd be wanting to chalk up the book as lame and move on. But wait...I'm not done. I still have a Good Cop routine to play out here. 
 Good Cop 
 1. All is not lost. I have to take into consideration that "Obsidian" had some strong points. Consider this. I started reading this book in bed last night, and after putting it away and trying to sleep for a couple of hours with no success, I picked it back up and read straight through until the sun came up. The book was pretty damn entertaining, when I wasn't taking comparison notes in my head. 
 2. The main characters do not echo Edward and Bella's relationship at all. The angsty pining is dialed way down in this book. I'd seen a mention of "stalking," but it never came across to me that way. The few times Daemon showed up, you felt like there was a reason (because there was actual danger out there), and not because he wanted to be a creeper observing Katy's beauty from the shadows. As for the romance itself -there was an inital "lust at first site" moment, yet Katy pretty much fought with Daemon the entire book. Even when she admitted her attraction, she still battled with the fact that she did NOT like him as a person, and thought he was a douche. I believe the author did a good job of not romanticizing the hotness too much. She makes a point to show us that being attractive does not automatically buy you a pass into someone's heart. There was a scene where the girl pretty much told the guy, "I have standards and you're not meeting them. Do something about this." Good for her. 
 3. I LIKED the sexual tension and banter in this book. Wowza. It was hot for a YA. If romances aren't your thing, you might want to pass this book up. If you like getting that fluttery feeling when people start invading each other's personal space (yes, I have an admitted weakness for this), then you'll be all over this book and enjoying it. 
 4. When the special talents and powers were described, it was actually pretty cool. I wanted to see these "beings of light." I loved the scene where Daemon started ripping up trees. The action scenes were few and far between, but there were a few tense moments/fight scenes/chase scenes, so it wasn't a complete romance sap-fest (even though we're not going to kid ourselves into thinking this book is anything but a romance). 
 5. There were a few humorous moments which did make me smile.