Harper Jane Price is the Queen Bee of the Grove Academy - and I mean Queen Bee in the Blair Waldorf sense and not the Serena van der Woodsen sense. She's active in all sorts of extracurricular, head of the cheerleading squad, presidents of numerous clubs and committees, has the perfect grades and the perfect boyfriend, and is a lock for Homecoming Queen of the Grove Academy. When she forgets to apply lip gloss on Homecoming night, she borrows her friend's and goes to the bathroom to apply it - where she meets a dying janitor who sort-of kisses her and passes his powers to her. Suddenly, Harper has ninja powers and can throw grown men across the room. She later discover that she's a Paladin, warriors meant to protect the Oracle - who happens to be David Stark, the one human in all Pine Grove which she cannot stand. David turns out to be the Chosen One (naturally) and Harper has to protect him in order to save the world.
I like Harper. She's sweet and mannered and very nice, but underneath all that you know she's got moxie. She cares very much for her friends and family and boyfriend and feels very bad when she has to start lying to them due to the whole "protect the oracle, save the world" thing. Harper is a girly girl, she can hold herself in a fight after she gets the power, and some things change about her, but nothing fundamental does, you know. She's still the same Harper that we all know and love. She's still quite shocked and is getting used to her new-found ninja skillz, but that doesn't mean she has to forget her manners, does it?
I'll admit, I'm a bit surprised when I find out that she has a boyfriend. Nothing in the blurb says anything about a boyfriend, so I assume she's single, but the instant the book opens with a boyfriend, we know he's not going to last. Sorry Ryan. I usually hate it when the protagonist has to break-up with her boyfriend in order to be with the ~bad~ boy whom she loathes because usually the boyfriend is a total sweetheart (if not bland) and the ~bad~ boy is a brooding, self-centered asshole who goes wangsting every single day and really, the boyfriend does not deserve it at all. Thankfully, this is not the case here, since the ~bad~ boy is not actually bad.
Okay, David's kind of an asshole at first (writing an article insinuating the girl you like is pregnant is not flattering and nice) but he mellows out as the book progresses. I want to hate David at first, because Ryan's a total sweetheart, but...I can't. I have a weakness for nerdy hipster guys and the instant he's described wearing horn-rimmed glasses and working in the school paper, my heart melts a little bit. Maybe for like ten seconds, I do hate him, but then he goes on wearing a Doctor Who t-shirt to an alleged college scholarship interview and has a Middle Earth map plastered on his room and wears tweed professor jackets and I. just. can't. I'm sorry. That's why I'm not too hung up on the romance. I understand why some people would be bothered with the romance and love triangle, but if I had a choice between Ryan (who passes his older brother's freshman psych papers as his because he's too busy practicing basketball for the worst team in Alabama) and David (who has overstuffed bookshelves filled with fantasy, classics, and journalism books and shops at thrift stores), I would totally choose David. That, and the fact that apart from the newspaper incident, which happens early in the book, he hasn't done anything jerky for the rest of the book. He's learned his lesson and that's a gold plus star for him.
The worldbuilding in this book is rock solid. The magic makes sense and everything governed by the rules actually works as the rules dictates; I have no complaints in that part. The plot is pretty straightforward in the Heroes "protect the cheerleader (oracle), save the world" kind of way and nothing in the way the story progresses kinda surprise me. I like the reverse role between Harper and David, though. Too often we have the main female protagonist to be the Chosen One and then she gets a hot brooding snarky guy as her bodyguard, but this book works in reverse. Harper isn't the Chosen One, it's all accidental that she gets to be a Paladin. David is the Chosen One, and he pretty much sits in the background as Harper does all the ass-kicking, and except for one scene where he smashes a lamp to a person's head, he's pretty much a non-action guy. I love girls kicking ass and boys being all pacifist and cheering them from the sidelines. The humor is pretty good too, the banter actually witty and not at all embarrassing. I also love the meta references; I laughed at Professor Giles X and yes, Harper is totally screwed on the origin story fence.
Overall Rebel Belle is a pleasant surprise: action-packed, witty, and sweet. It's a breezy and lovely read and I can't wait to read the sequels.
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