Books and Ashes

I received this book in exchange for an honest review

What I liked: I loved the setting of this story and the way the characters could detect people from the other two races by a scent each one emits. That was a new idea to me; something fresh and interesting! While the summary gives off an air that the romance will be a big player in this, it’s actually a sub plot and it stays really low-key throughout the story. It fits in nicely to the story, and it doesn’t take away from anything or overpower the main storyline. The characters are interesting, and we get a sense about the two boys that they have a rather interesting history when it comes to who they are any where they come from. We also see each of the characters become more in tune and accepting of the Core as the story progresses, but they still have doubts about what their Core is saying. I loved the self-doubt because it would be hard to listen to something you don’t completely understand and let most decisions be controlled by it when you ask. Of course, there are consequences when you don’t listen to what your Core says…

What I didn’t like: While I did enjoy the setting, it took quite a long time for me the even catch on to the technology this world is using considering we have people riding horses, people using horses to pull plows, oh look metal ship. Torpedoes. Also, there were some really weird names for foods that they used that looked like minor variations of actual words (marple instead of maple has really stuck with me). I just really didn’t see the point of making such minor changes and for the first few times marple was said I thought it was a spelling error, so when I finally caught on that it’s a word in this realm, I was quite confused about it. Some of the slang didn’t make sense either, but the one’s we know are pretty interesting and creative in a way. There were still some errors in the story though, small things that are easily fixable.

Overall Review: This is a really good, strong start to a new series that looks like it’s going to be rather interesting. With a very interesting take on the setting of this fantasy land, and a unique way to distinguish each race of people in this series I thought it was rather astounding, if at times somewhat confusing to me. There was plenty of action, suspense, and plenty of me flipping pages to figure out how they were going to get through their predicament and what was going to happen to everyone.

Recommend?: Oh yes! Be sure to pick up a copy of this book because it’s take on fantasy and racial identification was something I haven’t come across yet. Truly this is a unique read!