Wings of Arian (Solus, #1)

by Devri Walls

[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.