Tag: magic

YA

Review: Beheld by Alex Flinn

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Kendra Chronicles #4

beheld-alex-flinn#1 New York Times bestselling YA author Alex Flinn is back with magical twists on four fairy-tale favorites, each featuring a little help from Kendra, the witch from Beastly, as she searches through cities and centuries for her lost love.

Being a powerful witch, Kendra has survived it all. Since she first beheld James over three hundred years ago, Kendra has tangled with witch hunters and wolves, helped a miller’s daughter spin straw into gold, cowered in London as German bombs fell, and lived through who knows how many shipwrecks. But her powers have limits, and immortality can be lonely. Kendra isn’t ready to stop searching for the warlock she had met centuries ago.

With the help of her magic mirror, Kendra will travel the world to reconnect with her lost love—and, of course, she can’t help but play a hand in a few more stories along the way.

Featuring retellings of favorite fairy tales such as Little Red Riding Hood, Rumpelstiltskin, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, and The Ugly Duckling, Alex Flinn’s latest young adult novel, Beheld, is fresh fairy-tale fun from beginning to end.

 

2.5 Drink Me Potions

Rating: 2.5 stars

Thank you Edelweiss and HarperCollins for this copy in exchange for an honest review

**Beheld comes out January 10, 2017**

I read the first fairy tale retelling by Alex Flinn years ago, a title that had blew up to even be optioned as a film. Beastly. I really enjoyed it. Perfect balance of fairy tale, romance, and her own spin of things.

But these last few years?

I’ve been honestly a little disappointed. Oh, a number of fairy tale retellings since Beastly has come out, but none can really compare to Flinn’s best piece of work. Beheld is unfortunately no different.

Kendra is a fan favourite character since the time of Beastly. A teenage witch who accidentally causes mishaps when she tries to help out the humans around her. I was excited at the prospect of a story revolving around her, even when the synopsis said there’d be 4 fairy tales stuffed into this one story with Kendra being the glue holding all of them together as she journeyed through time in search for her lost love.

Sounds good, right? Especially if you liked Kendra.

It wasn’t as great as you may think. Only the first retelling on Little Red Riding Hood actually featured Kendra a lot. That’s where she met her love, James. Granted, it wasn’t even a good romance story. Totally insta-love. It’s like they had to fall for each other because they were the only wizard/witch they met in Salem at the time that were of about the same approximate age (although age can be deceiving when you’re born a witch).

Each story wasn’t even equal length. The 3rd story set in World War II era was short while the following story on the Ugly Duckling was extremely long. I was so irritated with the last one – it’s already near the end of the story and I’ve lasted this long – but Kendra’s not really there at all . She has no POV until like the very last chapter. She’s basically not present except for a scene or two. The others she interacted with the main character of those individual stories more, but even then, Beheld isn’t a story about Kendra.

No. Beheld is a 4-in-1 story of fairy retellings featuring Kendra in order to make sense of the connection between them. With each story as you go along, the less you get of Kendra and the more annoyed I get.

It’s not that I hated the retellings. They were okay, with some better than others. Short stories of love, friendships and going against all odds for a mostly happily ever after.

Due to their SHORT length, it also made it hard for me to connect and really feel for many of these characters either. Kendra would honestly be the only highlight. And she’s not the one you should be coming to these stories for.

If you loved Alex Flinn’s other retellings since Beastly, then you’d probably be okay with this book. It’s like another one of those stories. Otherwise? Don’t waste your time.

Overall Recommendation:
Beheld is an anthology of stories all connected by Kendra’s arc where she lost her love. However, it doesn’t do justice to its promise for more of Kendra with each individual story eclipsing her own. None of the characters really stuck with me for too long due to the short time we have with them so overall, this was a big letdown.

YA

Review: Hunted by Meagan Spooner

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Hunted #1

hunted-meagan-spoonerBeauty knows the Beast’s forest in her bones—and in her blood. Though she grew up with the city’s highest aristocrats, far from her father’s old lodge, she knows that the forest holds secrets and that her father is the only hunter who’s ever come close to discovering them.

So when her father loses his fortune and moves Yeva and her sisters back to the outskirts of town, Yeva is secretly relieved. Out in the wilderness, there’s no pressure to make idle chatter with vapid baronessas…or to submit to marrying a wealthy gentleman. But Yeva’s father’s misfortune may have cost him his mind, and when he goes missing in the woods, Yeva sets her sights on one prey: the creature he’d been obsessively tracking just before his disappearance.

Deaf to her sisters’ protests, Yeva hunts this strange Beast back into his own territory—a cursed valley, a ruined castle, and a world of creatures that Yeva’s only heard about in fairy tales. A world that can bring her ruin or salvation. Who will survive: the Beauty, or the Beast?

3 Drink Me Potions

Thank you Edelweiss and HarperCollins for this copy in exchange for an honest review

**Hunted comes out March 14, 2017**

A Beauty that could hunt and take care of herself? That sounds a lot more interesting than Disney’s version.

And honestly? It was. In a way.

Yeva and her 2 sisters found themselves in a dire situation when their father’s business venture failed and they were left in ruin. Always at heart in the forest where her father taught her everything he knew about the hunt, Yeva was half-delighted to be returning to their only home left near the heart of the forest.

Of course, there’s a Beast loose out in the depths of this forest.

I thought it was an interesting premise, but the execution of the story was different from what I expected. It’s not to say it was bad, but it was just…different. I’ve never been a huge fan of Beauty and the Beast. I find it hard to fall in love with such a beastly figure that kept you prisoner. Meagan Spooner did her best to make sure this romance was more believable.

The story takes a while to unfold to where you know it’s heading: when Beauty meets the Beast and becomes his prisoner. I was rather impatient during the beginning 1/4 as these details just didn’t capture my heart as much.

And once we were introduced to the Beast properly (besides the little bits at the end of each chapter that were designated from the Beast’s POV), things did get more exciting. Combining elements from apparently a Russian folklore, this was a very unique twist on the fairy tale.

However, at the end of the day, it just….lacked something. The romance wasn’t as deep and loving as I expected for a fairy tale. There weren’t enough moments between Beauty and the Beast that let me understand how she went from hatred to sympathy to such love.

And that ending? It was so rushed. I was so confused at how things wrapped up, although it does end nicely (as all fairy tales should). I wished the book was a little longer if that’s what it took to let the last 10% flesh out better. It just wasn’t executed in the best way, in my opinion.

For a Beauty and the Beast story, it did its best and it was a good retelling that stood out amongst all the others.

Overall Recommendation:
Hunted was a unique spin on the classic Beauty and the Beast fairy tale, with a bit of Russian folklore. Yeva wasn’t just some damsel in distress, and the way Beauty and Beast balanced each other out without one being always the dominant one was interesting. However, the execution of the story, especially the ending, left a less than satisfactory feeling as it concluded too fast and the romance just couldn’t make me sigh with happiness like fairy tales do.

YA

Review: A Shadow Bright and Burning by Jessica Cluess

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Kingdom on Fire #1

a-shadow-bright-and-burning-jessica-cluessHenrietta can burst into flames.

Forced to reveal her power to save a friend, she’s shocked when instead of being executed, she’s named the first female sorcerer in hundreds of years and invited to train as one of Her Majesty’s royal sorcerers.

Thrust into the glamour of Victorian London, Henrietta is declared the prophesied one, the girl who will defeat the Ancients, bloodthirsty demons terrorizing humanity. She also meets her fellow sorcerer trainees, handsome young men eager to test her power and her heart. One will challenge her. One will fight for her. One will betray her.

But Henrietta is not the chosen one.

As she plays a dangerous game of deception, she discovers that the sorcerers have their own secrets to protect. With battle looming, how much will she risk to save the city—and the one she loves?

 

3.5 Drink Me Potions

To be honest, I’m a little disappointed in how A Shadow Bright and Burning turned out. It was a highlighted book of 2016 for me, but with high expectations come a greater fall when it doesn’t reach them.

Taking the “chosen one” archetype and apparently flipping it on its head, Cluess’ debut novel seemed to have the beautiful elements of magic, monsters and romance, all set in Victorian London. Each and every one of these components are things I absolutely love to find in a book. So how did it turn all so wrong?

Henrietta Howel didn’t expect to be brought to London, discovered as the first female sorcerer since Joan of Arc. I liked her. She didn’t let a house full of boys (with far more training than she ever had) or the old and well-respected sorcerers intimidate her. But with the opportunity for a greater life than she had ever dreamed of, she brought along her best friend Rook, an Unclean. One who has been touched by the Ancients (aka a monster that’s the stuff of nightmares). Her kindness for someone who society would not want to touch made me like her. She stood up for the poor who weren’t protected by the sorcerers’ magic. She gave her own opinion when she didn’t agree with how things were done. She made for a great protagonist.

The issues I did have problems with were the other elements of the story.

Magic:
The world building wasn’t very extensive. Beyond another tool, called a stave, that seemingly replaced the functions of a wand, and how it could be used with certain body movements to control the elements, it was frankly a little tiring to read about. I found my eyes were glazing over the parts when they were training because it was just a lot of info dumped in a way that wasn’t very exciting. It felt more like info that had to be unloaded rather than organically fitting in with the plot.

This story is also a historical fantasy. Honestly? Besides the fact that Queen Victoria popped up occasionally in the plot, it hardly felt like the time period really mattered. Sure, they were in London, but the historical aspects just weren’t important as it could’ve been modern-day London society. The way they lived, the tools they used, none of that really connected with that time period and it was a let-down. History requires more intensive research, but Cluess just didn’t put the effort to actually encompass it into her story, like how The Dark Days Club did in this same genre.

Monsters:
Likewise, the world building here wasn’t extensive enough. We’re still left with many questions by the end of the book. Like why did the responsible party who unleashed these monsters do it? or where are they from so the sorcerers stop them? . Unfortunately, it seems either these details were meant to be shared later in the series, or were unimportant. The way one of the monsters was dealt with in the climax of the novel felt too rushed and anticlimactic. For a “chosen one” archetype that’s supposed to be different, it sure felt like the cliched version of this formula. It’s like Howel is unstoppable. She may not be THE chosen one, but she’s still more important and powerful than other (and frankly, more well-trained) sorcerers in the Order.

Romance:
Where do I even BEGIN with this? I had a feeling a love triangle would go down in this book as there are like, almost no female characters and Howel is surrounded by a house of guys. I’m at least happy that one guy becomes more of a brotherly figure to her, so it’s like a love pentagon or whatever. I personally favour one guy over another (of course), but the romance honestly didn’t do much for me. Which is saying a lot.

Both guys have their problems, and both make honest mistakes that I didn’t really appreciate. There is no one who is better for her. And I’m glad that it’s not a story that focuses on this point like it’s more important than EVERYTHING else that’s happening. But at the same time, the romance was almost so subtle that I didn’t feel anything for the guys. She hardly spent any alone time with either so there weren’t many moments that made me melt and think “awww they’re so cute together”. I’d rather she didn’t fall for anyone then and just focus on kicking monster butt.

SO….
Maybe I hyped this up a little too much in my mind. I waited a long time to get my hands on this novel and I may have expected way too much. However, it still had its moments, like learning the history of other magical beings beyond sorcerers or the mysterious attention given to Howel by the Ancients.

It may not have been the best book, but it was decent at least.

Overall Recommendation:
A Shadow Bright and Burning was a historical fantasy that barely focused on the historical aspect. Set in Victorian London, Henrietta found herself in a heap of lies as she figures she’s not the chosen one after all. With a world that wasn’t altogether explained very well, this novel tried to make itself fun and action-packed, but somehow missed the high bar it set. It had its good moments too, but all the elements I looked most forward to just weren’t put together as well as I had hoped it would. Plus, the romance just wasn’t so great, and that already puts me in a less than happy mood.