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Location: United States

Member Since: April 18, 2012

Athena Franks

Smashwords book reviews by Athena Franks

Frost on May 20, 2012

I was lucky enough to be given a free copy of this book to review by the author through Goodreads. I had read and reviewed The Curse Girl, by Kate Ellison, and I was really excited to be given the opportunity to read this one as well. I was not disappointed! Though this book was brief compared to what I usually read, the world was very well built and the characters were nicely fleshed out. I really liked Lia a lot. It was great to have a strong young female protagonist and I really felt for her. I liked Gabe, Ivy, and Jonn as well. I was expecting the twist at the end, but I wasn't expecting the *who*. I feel like I should have, but I thought it was going to be someone else. It was fun. At first I thought the person I suspected was good, then thought thatnerson was going to be the ultimate evil one of this installment. It was fun to be a bit surprised! :) I did have two issues. The first is that there were so many questions left unanswered for me--it wasn't so much the questions that I can see being answered in later books, like, "Who is Gabe, really?" but things that I felt may have been obvious to Kate Elliott when she was writing that didn't quite make it into the story. Things like the relationship between Lia and Ann--though it's mentioned a few times that they are close friends, I never really got that feeling. Maybe it's because they were both tormented by their own issues so were deliberately being distant toward each other, maybe it's a function of the story being told from the first person perspective. The second is that Lia and Gabe's relationship felt a little rushed to me. However, I will readily admit that may be due to my sadness that the story was over so quickly--I didn't want it to end! I am VERY happy I read this book. I really loved it and can't wait to read the next in the series and see where things go. I've only read two books by Kate Ellison and she is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors.