Reviewed by KitsuneBae on
Well, the first word that came out from my mouth after reading Storm Siren was WOW! I must admit that I only picked it up because the synopsis has similarities with the Winner’s Curse. I mean, the MCs were both slaves and were sold to people who are connected to the army. While I am not really WOWed by the Winner’s Curse , I still liked it and am hoping that book 2 will improve. But Storm Siren was really different. Its fast paced plot as well the beautiful writing captivated me from the start. Not to mention that the main character was somewhat reminiscent of X-men’s Storm and Frozen’s Queen Elsa. Yeah, you’ve read that right. The main charater, Nymia/Nym, is an Elemental who has white hair and can summon storm, ice and lightning. The only absent characteristic is the all-white eyes which is one of Storm’s trademark when she unleashes her power. So the similarity with Elsa was, aside from creating ice, Nym is also unstable, insecure and very scared to use her powers because she’s afraid of hurting or worse, killing people (which she accidentally did countless of times).
While the similarities that I’ve mentioned above should put me off, I wasn’t because the Storm Siren was different in a way that it painfully explored Nym’s past and present ordeal concerning her uncontrollable powers. I liked that her character development progressed in a realistic way and that her being the only heroine who can save the Kingdom of Faelen has a believable foundation to back the story.
The other characters were also interesting and I didn’t have a hard time getting attached to them. They were unique in their own ways and I just wished that… I couldn’t say it for fear of spoiling you. Sighs.
The world building and the magical system were also big pluses for this book. Kudos to the author for bringing me to Nym’s world without drowning me with annoying info dumps. Mary Weber introduced me to the culture of Faelen easily and the story flowed nicely.
Storm Siren’s romance was also praiseworthy because it didn’t bog down the whole story and remained on the sidelines. The advancement was convincing even if it was predictable as to whom Nymia will end up with. And thankfully, no love triangles or any geometric love for that matter even if the author has a lot of opportunities to do so.
But I think that the strongest point of Storm Siren is its plot. The story really blew me away and I was literally holding my breath when revelations after revelations came. I was like, “What? OMG! NOOO! Damn, Mary Weber, you didn’t just do that! How could you???!” As if the revelations weren’t enough, the events really turned crazy as Mary Weber played bookish god.
The only reason that stopped me from giving this book a five was that one glaring plot hole. Read the spoiler at your own risk.
Eogan, the love interest was the villain’s twin and because he wanted to start a new life, he made people believe that he is already dead and became one of Faelen’s people. Apparently, no one ever recognized him when he looked so much like his evil twin. And it’s not as if the evil twin is hiding or somewhat but I think it was really stupid for the Faelen people to not recognize that the handsome trainer is no other than the twin of one of their greatest foe.
To conclude, requesting Storm Siren from Netgalley has been a wise decision. It’s a 270 pager that managed to tell a story of a slave complete with twists and turns, and a heart wrenching romance.
*** An e-ARC was freely provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you so much, Thomas Nelson and Harper Collins!***
Reading updates
- Started reading
- 11 August, 2014: Finished reading
- 11 August, 2014: Reviewed