Silvara
Written on Aug 30, 2015
I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
I had no idea this was the 4th in a series when I requested it. However it did such a good job explaining what was going on, I was able to get the context and understand without having read the first 3 books. And without over-explaining or making it so it would be a slow read if you had read the first 3 books.
I loved this book! All the characters were well-developed, as was the world. The way immortality was done is something I haven't seen before. Instead of having immortality be just a state of being, it was almost like an object. This little bubble they kept in their chests, and if it was pierced then they lose it and truly die.
There were Hell's Angels, and motorcycles, soulmates and slowly falling in love, Evil being evil, and crawling back from the brink of madness.
I liked Alex, she had so many bad things happen to her, and yet she still tried so hard to do the right thing. She's strong and smart, and not in the over-the-top perfect way some main characters end up becoming.
Michael (or Mika'el) was my favorite character though. There was just something about him that made me hope he would be able to pull off finding Emmanuelle and save the world. He had just as many bad things happen, though in different ways, as Alex did. And every choice he made was like picking straws to find the least bad one he could.
I liked Bethiel, though his part in the story wasn't as focused on as some other characters. Aramael was talked about often enough that you get the feeling you know him, even though he never actually appears in the book.
The bad guys were believably bad, and had reasons that worked for being so. And the various governments acted in ways I would have expected them to as well. Even if those ways were crazy or stupid in the eyes of those characters in the know about what was really happening.
I will most definitely be picking up the first 3 books that I missed, and if you haven't read this series I highly recommend you do so!
This review was originally posted on Fantasy of the Silver Dragon