Frozen: Book 1 (Heart of Dread, #1)

by Melissa de la Cruz and Michael Johnston

Welcome to New Vegas, a city once covered in bling, now blanketed in ice. Like much of the destroyed planet, the place knows only one temperature - freezing. But some things never change. The diamond in the ice desert is still a 24-hour hedonistic playground and nothing keeps the crowds away from the casino floors, never mind the rumors about sinister sorcery in its shadows.

At the heart of this city is Natasha Kestal, a young blackjack dealer looking for a way out. Like many, she's heard of a mythical land simply called "the Blue." They say it's a paradise, where the sun still shines and the waters are turquoise. More importantly, it's a place where Nat won't be persecuted, even if her darkest secret comes to light.

But passage to the Blue is treacherous, if not impossible, and her only shot is to bet on a ragtag crew of mercenaries led by a cocky runner named Ryan Wesson there. Danger and deceit await on every corner, even as Nat and Wes find themselves inexorably drawn to each other. But can true love survive the lies?



Fiery hearts collide in this fantastic tale of the evil men do and the awesome power within us all. This is a remarkable first book in a spellbinding new series about the dawn of a new kind of magic.

• ISBN10: 1408334666
• ISBN13: 9781408334669
• Publish Date: 2 October 2014 (first published 14 September 2013)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 9 June 2021
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Hachette Children's Group
• Imprint: Orchard Books
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 368
• Language: English

Reviews

[Katie King]

**1 Star**

This book had a lot of promise. A post-apocalyptic, dystopian world covered in ice and trash and full of magic sounds kind of exciting, right? Well, this books really fails to deliver. Now, I am not the biggest fan of Melissa de la Cruz. But I thought that maybe this one would work for me since it was a departure from her vampire stuff. In actuality, the vampire stuff is probably better.

Natasha is a magical casino worker in New Vegas, where she is given a map in a locket that apparently leads to the Blue, an Atlantis-type mythical island with no ice and no trash. She retains the super-hot, gambler Wesson and his crew of smugglers to take her to New Crete, but she just wants to get to the nearby Blue. And so they set off on a boring-ass journey to an island that nobody is even sure exists, with the inklings of a relationship based on lies.

The entire book from that point is just random pieces of information garbled together in some semblance of the English language. While reading this, I liked to think that de la Cruz cut her newspapers together and glued chunks of paragraphs into the rough draft. If so, this book makes a lot more sense. If not, well, I'm not sure how this made it past the editor.

For example, throughout the book a strange variety of things happen. The ship leaves port, encounters other smugglers, encounters refugees (elf with magic powers, the other two are like dwarves), they discover Natasha's powers, encounter a drakon (Dragon? Kraken?) controllable by the elf, face a failed mutiny, find the Blue, have a drakon fight with some random navy on the outskirts of the magical Blue place that apparently exists. That sounds like a lot to cram into 336 pages because IT IS.

The writing is horrific. Natasha discovers she can ride the drakon to save the day because of the following exchange:

Elf: Wow, too bad there aren't any drakonrydders to ride the drakon, lay waste to this army, and save the day.
Natasha: Wait a second...

That isn't even the worst part, but it just shows how this random information is introduced exactly when needed and not a moment sooner. These drakonrydders are NEVER discussed EVER before that point, and NEVER after it. Same thing goes with Natasha's mysterious powers, insta-love with Wesson, and her crap personality. This is a horrible book.

[shannonmiz]

I was hoping I would enjoy this book, because 1) Vegas and 2) Frozen world. I'd read about 15% and I was calling it quits, for the time being. I had no idea what was going on, and I kind of didn't care. Plus, the copy I had looked more like a ransom note than an ebook (look, I get having an unfinished proof, but goodness, this was too much!) and it was incredibly hard to read, when names and places weren't capitalized, font sizes were all over the place, etc.

But  I actually started to like it after awhile! I had gotten a bit used to the world and the characters, and even though the text was gibberish, my eyes were starting to compute. I liked Nat and Wes, and really was started to get interested in what was happening to them. A good chunk of the book ended up taking place in a sea of frozen garbage... or something. Basically, Wes and his crew were being paid by Nat to take her to "the Blue" (which, incidentally, I feel like I have read before), and so it was a sea-trip of sorts, with all kinds of people trying to stop them on their illegal journey. That part was okay for awhile, I was even kind of getting into it, but then weird stuff that didn't make sense started happening. Someone ended up overboard,  and everyone was like "okay, cool, see you never". And then all kinds of magical junk started showing up, and it made absolutely no sense, certainly not in the context of this book. I couldn't keep track of who had powers, who didn't, and (importantly to me) why. Then there were so many random groups of "bad guys", they were just showing up all over the place. I don't want to say too much of course, but suffice it to say that the ending was completely ridiculous, made zero sense, and basically made me just scream in frustration. I guess it was supposed to set up the next book but um, nope. It just confused me and made me angrier.

The world building... I needed more of it. Maybe some of these random powers and such would have worked if there was more of a context for them to work in. But as it stood, there were just so, so many unanswered questions for me that I couldn't get any visual of the setting. I was just getting "cold, dead stuff, ocean-like body of water, magic". And a kid eating his jacket, because that happened.

The other issue I had was that the characters felt like they could have worked. The bones were there, and maybe they'll be developed more in future books that I won't be reading, but they were kind of shells. I kept waiting for the character development to come, because it felt kind of close, but it never did. I feel like this book could have been a lot better had it been in first person dual POVs, but the third person dual POVs made me feel quite detached from both characters.

I guess the bottom line is that the whole book could have worked. The premise was pretty fantastic, and the characters had potential (hence the star and a half that I ended up giving it), but it never delivered, and then just got weird, complicated, confusing, and downright annoying.

1.5 Stars

*Copy provided for review via Netgalley

 
This review was originally posted on It Starts at Midnight

[tweetybugshouse]

This book was amazing, i love the cover the new one, the orginal one not so much you stick a dragon on the cover and i am all in. Nat is a great character and the whole concept of the marked and Nat being the savior and defender of some place called the blue. It great a high fantasy novel, with lots of twists and turns. First book i read from this author though i do love the tv version of Witches of East end. Can't wait for more.

[angelarenea9]

I recently got this book as an ebook arc from NetGalley

An adventure right from page one, this book was fast paced and engaging from page one. I felt like a kid on their first trip to the aquarium, wide eyed and staring around at every new and exciting detail! From the beautiful and creatively crafted world, to the mysterious twists that urge you to turn the page! I couldn't put this book down! I also really like the way the book is broken into sections and chapters because it was really hard to put this book down and the sections offered a good breaking point for necessities like eating and sleeping.
The characters are interesting, and incredibly likable, and there was just enough mystery to turn up the excitement for book two.
The only issue I had was that it was a little difficult to figure out the world at first, but in the end, piecing it together added to the experience and only made it better.

I recommend this book to anyone who loves fantasy and dystopian books!

[Kim Deister]

Wow. I could stop right there... but I won't. This is a FANTASTIC read! I haven't yet read any of de la Cruz's other work, the author of the Blue Bloods series among others. I am not sure what I was waiting for?! This is co-authored by her husband, who has, unknown to the world, collaborated on previous works with his wife.

The world as we know it has ended, covering the Earth with ice and changing society right along with it. The world building in this book was amazing, almost but not quite unrecognizable from our own. Most of the book takes place in New Vegas, the post-apocalyptic Las Vegas. California and New York have been wiped off the map, as has much of the RSA... the Remaining States of America. Everything has changed, from society to agriculture to the military to everyday life. Along with all the changes are the emergence of new forms of humanoid life. And we all know that human beings do not always react well to that which is different.

This book was thoroughly engrossing, from being drawn into the world and drawn to the characters. Nat is mysterious, but strong, brave, and intelligent. Wes is tough, loyal, and smart... the perfect foil for Nat. Each of the members of Wes' team, although generally supporting characters, had a story of their own and illicited feeling, whether affectionate or not. It was hard sometimes to remember that this is a YA novel. For example, Wes is only 16 and already a veteran of the army and a man responsible for his team, some of whom are as young as 13 or 14. One of his enemies is only 19, but there is a mental image of a man much younger than that. They are all cast into adult roles far earlier than they would be in our own society, with the new world having a much shorter life span than our own. It is in those moments that you are reminded of their ages that the stark reality of the world of Frozen is really driven home.

The world in this book is reflective our own, a world that has been smashed, abused, and changed by the government, the military, religion, humanity, and science to create a new world and society, with ambivalent results. There are messages in this book. Messages on the state and values of society, on the capacity for human cruelty in the face of adversity, and messages, too, on the capacity for kindness in the face of adversity. There was a part that I loved, one that clearly delineated the difference between our society and that of the post-apocalyptic Frozen world:

"While they ate, Nat told them that back before the floods, fat was a sign of poverty, and the rich flashed their status by going on extreme diets - juice "cleanses" and spa vacations where they paid for the privilege of not eating. None of them believed her."

Things to love about Frozen...

--The characters. Whether you loved them, hated them, felt sorry for them, or were annoyed by them, they were each fascinating people with their own histories and stories.
--The world. There isn't much to love about this world in reality, but it was so well written that you lived there, too, and were a part of the story.

Things I wanted more of...

--Shakes. I loved him, his loyalty, his courage.
--The Slaine brothers. They seemed so different from each other and I wanted to know more about them.

My recommendation: A fantastic read that you should plan for... you will need a block of time because you won't be able to put it down!