Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I have read through many of the other reviews on this book and I am unsatisfied with the reasons points given in the low reviews. I agree with them that this is not a good book, but for different reasons. Most of those reviewers sighted things like "bad language", "adult themes", etc. These elements are certainly present in the book, but the reviewers must be years out of high school if they think teens aren't inundated with them already. The "F" word; chain smoking; trailer-park living; yaoi porn manga; alcoholic, irresponsible parents; abusive boyfriends; teen dropouts; teen pregnancies; teen gossip: I kid you not. These are things I overhear girls talking about every day at my high school. If anything, this book was more realistic in its portrayal of teens than anything I have read thus far. From what I have observed, my fellow teens drink this kind of ugly mellow drama right up: that is why we have shows like Jerry Springer and all its spin offs. The flat-charactered teens in Tithe were much like the ones in my high school. Glorifying the petty rebellions of shoplifting and cigarette smoking? Check. Drooling lack of back-bone around a "hot" guy? Check. Petty jealous fights when one girl gets "friendly" with another's boyfriend? Check. It is enough that I have to listen to such things at school, I don't want to read them in my escapist, fantasy books too. In conclusion, this is not a book about fairies. It is a book about teen drama in which fairies are added as an appeal to the "Goth" culture that shops (or shop-lifts) at Hot Topic. (I apologize that this is more of a rant than a review. Feel free to tack on as many "unhelpful" ratings as you want. I feel a certain amount of irony that no matter how many bad reviews this book gets, it will never dip below four stars. After all, Amazon knows: low ratings don't sell books.)