Chosen

Check out our episode here! (Featuring Marked, Betrayed and Chosen) Chosen by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast

Chosen starts on Zoey’s birthday, which is also Christmas Eve. She hates her birthday because people always smoosh it together with Christmas and get her Christmas-themed gifts. Her friends disappoint her with the usual birthmas presents, like super expensive boots with Christmas trees on them from Erin and Shaunee, a cashmere scarf with a snowman from Damien, a Tiffany snowman necklace from her boyfriend Erik and a snowglobe. Okay, so the snowglobe isn’t great, but it’s from the newest member of the Nerd Herd, Jack Swift, who also happens to be Damien’s boyfriend. Yeah yeah, he appeared in the last book and we forgot to mention him. Oops. Zoey’s disappointment shows and her friends feel bad about their gifts, especially when she opens her gift from Heath that is not Christmas themed with a card that mentions how much she hates Christmas themed gifts. Erik definitely doesn’t like that Heath knows more about Zoey than anyone. Man, Zoey’s a jerk.

She goes to meet her grandma after that awkward scene and gets a lavender plant and a first edition copy of Dracula, which are great, non-Christmas-themed things. Her mom shows up with a Christmas birthday cake and her gift, the Heffer family Bible. Oh, just what she always wanted! She knows that her steploser is lurking somewhere and has a scene with them all at Starbucks. Again, man, Zoey’s a jerk. But at least this time, she has a reason. Her mom and stepdad are… not the best people in the world. They are garbage people.

During her time off campus, Zoey meets up with the undead-dead Stevie Ray, eating a homeless woman in an alley. They kind of talk like normal, about Zoey’s birthmas presents and Heath and Erik and maybe whatever’s going on with Loren. She convinces Stevie Ray to meet up with her again so she can get a shower and some clean clothes. When she gets back to campus, she goes to pray to Nyx and she’s met by Erik. He complains about their relationship and asks if he should just leave her alone for a while since he can’t compete with Heath’s imprint. She says no (but she should have said yes because, come on. Stop stringing these boys along, jerk.) They start making out, complete with Zoey sucking Erik’s… blood… when they are interrupted by Loren Blake. Oh great. Loren, who Zoey has a crush on and who might be grooming her like some sort of vampyre pedo. Great. Erik becomes upset and/or jealous about Loren, but then they gloss over that and start talking about replacing Stevie Ray in her circle as Earth since she’s the leader of the Dark Daughters. They plan to try to cast a circle using Erik to stand in, but that’s in a little bit. They also make plans to go to the movies and do lots of stuff as a group. Zoey manages to plan those things around secretly meeting up with Stevie Ray. She’s very sneaky and a huge liar.

Before they do all that, Loren finds her and gives her diamond earrings for her birthday and they make out and decide that they’re going to see each other on the sly. Zoey is a very sneaky huge liar jerk face. Later, they try to cast the circle but it doesn’t work with Erik. But guess who’s lurking around the corner, cursing about having a vision that she needs to be right where the Nerd Herd is? Aphrodite, who now has an affinity for Earth. She also had another vision, this one about Stevie Ray, who Zoey hasn’t told anyone about because she’s a sneaky liar jerk face, and that if they don’t stop what happens in the vision, Neferet pulling Stevie Ray out into the sun where she bursts into flames, then lots of vampyres are going to die and Nyx isn’t going to be happy. So Aphrodite offers to let Stevie Ray stay in her old house because her family’s out of town and figures out how to get her blood since she definitely needs it. They plan to take her more later.

When they get back from helping Stevie Ray, Zoey and Aphrodite find the body of one of the professors who was decapitated. Oh that’s great. I wonder who did that… the crazy zealots of the People of Faith or Neferet… Probably the crazy zealots. Probably. Looks like them anyway. There was a bible verse staked to her after all. Zoey runs straight into Neferet and pretends that she’s so happy to see her since she can help with the dead professor scene. Neferet locks down the campus by calling in the Sons of Erebus, who are hunky vampyre warrior studs. Now they can’t get off campus to help Stevie Ray. Uh oh.

Zoey runs into Loren and they make out and he sexual-predator-grooms her some more. Then she learns how to sneak off campus from Aphrodite to see… Heath. Because of course she does. She tells him that they need to break up but they make out instead and she drinks more of his blood. Then some vagrants approach them during their grinding session and Zoey uses her affinity for air to blow them away… into oncoming traffic. They’re murdered. But we kind of forget about that. She then goes to meet up with Stevie Ray and tells her about all her boyfriend stuff. And then she gets caught sneaking back onto campus, but her friends cover for her. Because they’re nice. Not lying jerk monsters.

It’s time for the ritual where Aphrodite will be standing in for Stevie Ray. She tells Zoey that she needs to heal Stevie Ray and Zoey’s like, I can’t do that. But yeah, she probably can. They have a school ritual to cleanse the area of the professor’s death and that’s when Erik starts coughing. Oh no. is he dying now, too? Nope. He’s made the change to adult vampyre. Loren finds Zoey after the ritual and they have sexy times, Zoey’s first time, because what’s better than celebrating your boyfriend’s change into an adult vampyre than having sex with your teacher? This creates an imprint between Loren and Zoey and breaks the imprint between Zoey and Heath. So that’s at least good… right? She also tells Loren all about Stevie Ray, except for the fact that Neferet is behind it, and then Erik walks in on them. Cool.

The next day, Zoey goes back to see Loren and when she gets to his door, she hears him inside. With Neferet. And they planned the whole thing. Which is super gross. They also used Zoey’s phone to text Stevie Ray to get her to come to campus. Luckily Zoey was there first. And also all her friends. And Erik. Who tells everyone that Zoey’s been with Loren. And everyone hates her. Which Neferet also planned. They have a circle to heal Stevie Ray, who hates it that Aphrodite has taken her place, so she attacks her in the middle of the circle-casting and nearly drinks all her blood. Zoey can’t break the circle but has to finish it even though Stevie Ray is eating Aphrodite. Magically, Aphrodite doesn’t die and the healing works and Stevie Ray changes to a new kind of Vampyre. She has completed the change, but her marks aren’t blue, they’re red. Interesting. Also, Aphrodite doesn’t have a mark anymore. She sacrificed her mark for Stevie Ray’s humanity.

Just when you think everything’s going to wrap up nicely, I mean, not so nice since everyone hates Zoey and Aphrodite isn’t a vampyre fledgling anymore, but at least Stevie Ray is fine now, Zoey is wracked with painful spasms. New marks from Nyx? Yes, but also… her imprint with Loren breaking. Because he’s just been murdered. And Neferet plans to start a war with all humans. She blames Zoey for everything and claims that she loved Loren, but we know that’s not true. She and Zoey have another threatening stand-off, but this time, Erik overhears and understands that while Zoey is a complete garbage person, Neferet is worse. Now, really to wrap things up, Nyx tells Zoey, "Believe in yourself, Daughter, and get ready for what is to come."