Wings of Arian (Solus, #1)

by Devri Walls

Kiora thought she had never heard a lie until she was sixteen. But she was wrong. Her entire existence was based on nothing but. She thought that evil did not exist. Lie. That magic was not real. Lie. And that the land of Meros was all there was. One more lie.

With Aleric telling her that evil is knocking on the door and that she is the only one who can stop them she has a choice to make. Refuse, or start the wildest most painful ride of her life.

She reluctantly dips her toe into her new existence of magic and threads, dragons and shapeshifters, and the person who wants to take control of it all: the evil Dralazar.

However, this journey was never meant to be hers alone. She will be accompanied by a Protector. To her disbelief, and utter irritation they name the hotheaded, stubborn, non-magical, (albeit gorgeous) Prince Emane. They will have to trust each other with their lives, but right now Kiora would settle for a non hostile conversation.

And now it comes down to this, If you had never heard a lie, would you know when you heard one? Is knowing good from evil innate? Kiora finds herself having to decide who lives and who dies on those very questions.

• ISBN10: 1938426525
• ISBN13: 9781938426520
• Publish Date: 8 September 2012
• Publish Status: Active
• Imprint: Stonehouse Ink
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 486
• Language: English

Reviews

[inlibrisveritas]

3.5 Stars!

Wings of Arian is a detailed and unique high fantasy story that has many of the elements I’ve come to adore over the years. I was surprised to see that this was a larger length book for YA high fantasy and I actually wanted it to be even longer, but Wings definitely sets a solid start for the Solus series.

Meros is a land in a valley where evil no longer exists and the world is content, or at least that was the case until the new Solus is called forth. The Solus is the magical protector of Meros, and they are only chosen when things seem the most dire and things are getting very dangerous very fast. I really liked the detail Walls put into Meros and I’m really excited to see that the next book explores places beyond it. The story is fairly fast paced but it does slow down in sections to give you time to digest information and allow the main characters some time to learn and process new developments. The war of good versus evil is a pretty interesting and when you think about how pure the land of Meros is you realize just how much is at stake in this series. There are also some twists that I wasn’t expecting and I still have some questions about some of them but I’m pretty sure book two will probably expound on them.

Kiora is an incredibly sweet girl who doesn’t really have much of a filter on her mouth, if she thinks it she’s just as likely to say it. At times she does skew into the naive, but she does have a ton of pressure on her and given that evil is something entirely new to her it’s only logical that she would often find herself completely overwhelmed. I did find that she was highly emotional at first but as I continued to learn about her past and her magical abilities I actually understood why she let the emotions bubble forth like she does. Her Protector is Emane and he’s a great balance to her sweet, emotional naivety. He’s steady, strong, and isn’t surprised by much; but like her he his flaws, like his trouble with expressing his feelings. Their relationship is really sweet, and guess what…no insta-love! It actually takes Kiora and Emane some time to open up fully with each other and even then Kiora has her reservations given the amount of pressure riding her shoulders. There is also a wide array of side-characters but those among my favorites are Morcant and Arturo, a dragon and a pegasus. Morcant is like a friendly Smaug, he loves to talk and quick to anger but he’s incredibly friendly. Besides, who doesn’t love a dragon? Arturo is a voice of reason in a now chaotic world and I love how he was more than willing to help Kiora when she needed it.

So in short I definitely see myself continuing this series. I’m more than a little curious to see how Kiora fares in new territory and just what Dralazar is going to attempt next.

[Kelsenator]

For more reviews make sure to visit my blog Kelsey's Cluttered Bookshelf!

I won a copy of this a while back, and I’m glad I finally got around to reading it. I really liked the story, the characters and of course all the magic and magical creatures. Not only are there the Guardians (kind of like Faeries but nicely different), shapeshifters, but also dragons!! I love dragons too, even though most of them in this are evil, which was still cool with me. The Solus was a pretty awesome concept, someone so powerful to bring an end to evil and darkness, and it was all inside of a normal girl!

The character I liked the most was Emane, he was strong and willing to protect Kiora, but he showed so much emotion, and he changed and started to learn love as the book went on (he’s the one on the front cover of this). The main character Kiora was pretty neat too, I loved that she was so strong magic-wise, even if she did cry a lot.

One thing I would have liked to see, was a bit more at the beginning. For instance, the prologue gets you all ready for Aleric to search for the Solus, so I got anxious to see the journey to find them, then see them grow into their role and how they were accepted and so on. But the first chapter starts past that, it fast forwards like two weeks after they found her, and she’s already using a bit of magic and growing fast into her role. They also talk of the first meeting between Kiora and Emane, and it sounds hilarious, but I would have rather read it first hand than in their memories. I felt like I was missing a chapter is all, but they do tell you about it briefly.

I liked this book and how it was exploring the magical world in an interesting way. I’m definitely excited to get started on the next book!

[Angie]

The cover totally screams Paranormal Romance, not High Fantasy, but that's okay because it's a genre that I'm growing to love. But the description is also quite misleading. Lies do not make up as huge of a part as it makes it out to be. Yes, Kiora has been lied to in a sense, but the actuality of the situation is that no one talks about magic where she's from, since no one knows it exists. At least not until an ancient prophecy is coming to life, and even then only those involved learn about the magic.

I did enjoy this book, but let's start with what I didn't like. Number one being Kiora. She's just not an interesting heroine, at all. She's the chosen Solus, who is a magical human that is suppose to banish evil once and for all. Of course, she's also the most epic magic user in history. However, she has no flaws, unless you count being overly good, sweet, innocent, and caring as a flaw. Throughout the book you always know that she's going to do the nice thing (not necessarily the right thing) no matter what. Evil creatures are about to kill them, they have been disarmed, does she kill or even injure them so they can't get her? Nope, she just leaves and pleads with everyone else whose lives are in danger to just leave them be. Sure that's nice, but it's a war! They will kill whoever they can as soon as they're able! She also cries a lot, about everything.

The second problem is that the story isn't that memorable. I read parts of this over three different days and found that I couldn't remember what had just happened during my previous reading session. That's not good. There was nothing that kept me excited to keep reading, which is why it took me so long to finish.

Now for the good stuff. I loved the magic! It was interesting to watch Kiora learn about her magic and read parts of the ancient text that she's studying. This was also the only time Kiora wasn't perfect. She would sometimes mess up spells with disastrous results, or accidentally do something really awesome. I think the way magic works was explained very well without being info dumpy.

Shapeshifters, Pegasus (Pegases? Pegasi?), and dragons, oh my! I adored these mythical creatures! Arturo, the Pegasus, has so much attitude! He steals almost every scene he's in! The shapeshifters were also especially awesome. They can morph into anything they imagine, including things that don't even exist (Drustan turns into something hilarious at one point). My favorite part of the book was when Kiora and Emane were staying with the shapeshifters. There's also a budding romance, but that hasn't gone very far yet, so I don't have much to say about it.

Overall, this was an enjoyable enough read, if not very memorable. The plot is the typical good versus evil, but I'm still not sure I know why Dralazar is doing what he's doing, but there's still two more books. I hope things clear up sooner rather than later. I'm definitely looking forward to more magic, more Arturo, and more romance! Hopefully in the next book Kiora becomes less goody-goody, too.

Read more of my reviews at Pinkindle Reads & Reviews.