+++ MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS +++ 
 This, I am sorry to say, was by far the worst book I've read so far this year. 
 After an unfortunate run of spectacularly mediocre YA-novels (The Dark Days Club and These Vicious Masks) I had hoped to finally happen upon a book that would keep me hooked (if you'll excuse the pun) and entertained throughout. 
 Sadly, it was not to be. 
 The premise sounded engaging: A dark, twisted version of Neverland, a Pan with dubious intentions and, of course, a handsome rogue of a pirate- hard to mess up, one would think. 
 Hard, but, alas, not impossible. 
 One of my two main complaints was Gwendolyn, the protagnist. Seldom have I disliked a character almost instantly from page one. Gwen is a whiny, spineless coward who seems almost incapable of making decisions or taking charge. Instead she relies on whichever boy is currently at hand, constantly getting distracted by their masculine charms instead of thinking for herself or being her own agent ((view spoiler)[ like when Rowan/Hook throws the boy to the sea-monsters, instead of being terrified, outraged or in ANY way genuinely moved, Gwen dwells on his disctracting nearness while he restrains her. (hide spoiler)]). 
 I find this sort of female character absolutely infuriating. Instead of taking action or at the very least use her brain to summon even an ounce of healthy scepticism, she either conforms to stereotypes (he's a pirate so he must be the villain) or finds her delicate feminine senses overwhelmed by the sheer hotness of each guy and thus just never feels the need to assert herself or her independance. Things happen to her, but rarely through her. When she (view spoiler)[ discovers her fey-powers, thus gaining the potential to become an actual - and powerful - player in the game, she instead whines and frets because she "doesn't know how" to use them (hide spoiler)]. 
 If it could have been possible to climb into the book and give her a good shake, her teeth would not have stopped rattling. 
 I do get that towards the end she comes a bit into her own, but by that time I had already stopped caring what would happen to her. 
 The second major peeve was the language. 
 While I do not expect Shakespearean phrases when I pick up a YA-novel, I do expect at the very least a pleasant, flowing style of writing. 
 Again, I was to be disappointed. The book is full of repetitions, often, the same word is repeated twice in the same sentence which is both lazy and not at all conducive to an enjoyable reading experience. Whole phrases appear over and over, often verbatim ((view spoiler)[ Fiona and/or the Queen cock their heads at an unnatural or akward angle at least three times (hide spoiler)]). Also, none of the characters had any distinction, Hook's occasional "aye" and "lass" seemed more taken from a 'how-to-write-a-pirate-101' (or TV series Once upon a time, at that) than to be an actual expression of his character. 
 Add to that several typos and you get a case of seriously shoddy editing. 
 The story about the boy and his brother, which is told in snippets at the beginning of each chapter was rather predictable (as was the whole book, for that mater) and hardly necessary, in my opinion ((view spoiler)[ also, I found the end made no sense: when Gwen and Rowan visit his brother's grave in France, why was there no marker for him? If he never returned from battle, he would have been presumed dead in action and a ceremony would have been held even if there wasn't a body. This may only be a minor detail which I would not have minded in an otherwise engaging story, but here it just itrritated me further as it added lazy research to all its other faults. (hide spoiler)]). 
 The male leads were equally colourless, and while I liked Rowan a mite better than Pan, he, too, failed to keep my interest. 
 This book, to me, was an unfortunate example of a good and promising idea gone wrong. 
 Two stars for the premise and the descriptions of Neverland which were at least creative and interesting in an otherwise bland story peopled by characters I just could not bring myself to care about.