This was quite a unique book. As I was reading, I just kept thinking, "Wow, this is really dark." The three main characters are high school acquaintances Morgan, Ondine, and Nix. They have always felt they were different from others, and as the story begins, things are really starting to change in their lives. Nix has dropped out of school because he can't handle seeing rings of light around people who are about to die. Morgan sleep walks into the forest at night (still not exactly clear on what she does there). Ondine sees butterflies on her ceiling come to life. James "Moth" Motherwell is a little older than the three of them and a little shady, but he obviously has some supranatural mind-powers where he can, for instance, persuade the gas station attendant to sell Ondine and Morgan alcohol. **Some spoilers now follow** Eventually, Moth gets all three of them to attend this huge "concert" in the mountains where it becomes clear that Ondine, Nix, and Morgan are "changelings." They will eventually go through an "exidis" and leave their corporal human bodies to become simply conscious matter. They all resist this realization in various degrees, and there is added conflict in the story when another character, Bleek, is a "cutter" who intends to use them in various ways to extend his own life (which will mean that they are doomed to eternal conscious suffering rather than going through their exidis).Some of the ways that this book is "dark" include the extensive use of "dust" (apparently a type of drug), Morgan's somewhat sadistic actions towards animals (including smushing a frog with her windshield wipers), and a final climactic scene in the dark underground tunnels where Bleek has tortured their friend Neve and impregnated her. I liked the book in that I was interested in the story and figuring out what was going to happen, and the characters were well developed. But it was unsatisfying in the end (Smith has said she intends to write sequels), and I was left very confused about a lot of what goes on with the changelings and why (perhaps this was intentional on the author's part to convey the confusion that the characters feel).
See Trisha's post about it here on The Ya Ya Yas blog A(long with some more of my comments).
