4.18.2017 | Tuesday

Daughter of Smoke & Bone

Item: Daughter of Smoke & Bone
Rating: 5
Author: Kim

category: Book Reviews
tag(s): young adult
0 Comments

title: Daughter of Smoke & Bone
author: Laini Taylor
series: Daughter of Smoke & Bone #1
published: 17 September 2011
genre(s): fantasy, romance
pages: 422
source: library
format: hardcover
buy/shelve it: Amazon | B&N | BookBub | StoryGraph

rating:

the blurb

Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil’s supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherworldly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real, she’s prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands", she speaks many languages - not all of them human - and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she’s about to find out.

When beautiful, haunted Akiva fixes fiery eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

my review

I closed the book after the final page and wondered to myself… why did I wait so long to read this book? The story, the characters, the writing… all of them were so enchanting and engrossing. Everything about this book was magical!

Set in the city of Prague, Karou lives alone in a flat and attends art school. Her sketchbooks are filled with fantastical drawings that her best friend and fellow students yearn to see. But she has secrets, secrets that not even her best friend knows. And as many secrets as she herself keeps, there are secrets kept from her, too. The kind of secrets that change everything. These secrets also make the feelings she comes to have for Akiva even more tumultuous and chaotic.

The author’s writing is beautiful, as is her world building. It was like reading a fairy tale with its lyrical prose. The mythos of the angels is very different from the traditional Christian conception that most of us are familiar with. And even more interesting is that these angels are generally on the “evil” side of the “good versus evil” construct. But the insights into the world of the angels through Akiva make one thing very clear… there are two perspectives to be had for each and every situation.

This is a story of love and coming together, but it is also a world about perceptions and fighting for what you believe in. It’s about the struggle that comes from within and without when your ideology bucks against that which is expected. It is, simply put, beautiful.

About Laini Taylor

Hi! I write fantasy books. My latest is STRANGE THE DREAMER, about a young librarian, a mythic lost city, and the half-human children of murdered gods. Check it out :-) Before that I wrote the DAUGHTER OF SMOKE & BONE trilogy, which has been translated into 32 languages. It’s about a blue-haired art student raised by monsters, a broken angel, and a war that has raged for 1000 years in another world. I also wrote LIPS TOUCH: THREE TIMES, which was a National Book Award finalist, and the DREAMDARK books. As well as various short stories and novellas.

Website | Goodreads | Amazon