Days of Blood and Starlight

Days of Blood & Starlight by Laini Taylor
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“Once upon a time, a girl lived in a sandcastle, making monsters to send through a hole in the sky.”

Seraphim reign triumphant over their defeated chimera enemies, and former lovers Karou and Akiva, separated by war and betrayal, see no hope for restoring peace to their fractured world.

With her memory restored, Karou begins helping Thiago, bulk up the tiny remnants of his chimera army using the resurrection magic she learned at Brimstone's elbow. She doesn't see a better way to help her people, but she feels continually threatened by Thiago's brutal nature and their past history (like how he executed her - it's hard to get over that).

Akiva returns to his brother and sister, Hazael and Liraz. His new job is to track down the free chimera and enslave them, and he does everything he can to spare the chimera, regretting his deadly mistake. Meanwhile in Prague, the world is angel-crazy and Zuzana and Mik search for their missing friend Karou.

How to describe the lost love between Akiva and Karou in this desperately romantic series? Here's an excerpt that sums it up perfectly:

“Yeah? Okay," she said, staring up into the stars. "Let's see. You know how, at the end of Romeo and Juliet, Juliet wakes up in the crypt and Romeo's already dead? He thought she was dead so he killed himself right next to her?"
"Yeah. That was awesome." A pause, followed by "Ow," suggested elbow punctuation on the part of Mik.
Karou ignored it. "Well, imagine if she woke up and he was still alive, but..." She swallowed, waiting out a tremor in her voice. "But he had killed her whole family. And burned her city. And killed and enslaved her people.”

Yep. Lots of angst. But Karou seems more human in this book than the last, and there's a credible third to form a potential love triangle, especially since the lovers are estranged (but yearning. So much yearning). Thiago was never in the running, after all, but now - no spoilers.

If you haven't read Daughter of Smoke and Bone, you'll find yourself lost in Karou's world, so definitely start at the beginning. The final book, Dreams of Gods and Monsters, is scheduled for April 2014 and I know I'm not the only one who finds that a crazy long time to know what happens to Karou and Akiva. So in the meantime, check out the unique Grisha series by Leigh Bardugo, starting with Shadow and Bone. The titles may be similar, but there's no chance of mixing these series up once you've read them.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Karou is a blue-haired artist in Prague whose free time is spent running errands for monsters - until one day she is attacked by a seraphim and beings to learn the truth about herself and her own world. Karou and the seraphim Akiva feel an instant attraction to each other, but they are on opposite sides of a centuries-long conflict and the rift may be too deep to cross.

Karou struck me as a bit of a Jack Reacher-esque super-character: she speaks a dozen languages flawlessly, is a talented artist, knows martial arts, and is impossibly beautiful and skinny. This makes her a little tough to like (I'm someone who got sick of Paul Atreides in Dune because he basically turns into Jesus at the end, and overly perfect characters are a tad boring*.) She also has mysterious origins

Akiva has fiery wings, which immediately puts me into his corner. Perfect people are boring, but kick-ass angels are another matter.**

Castiel from Supernatural

Akiva's been bred as a soldier and years before lost the love of his life, a woman named Madrigal. He's gorgeous, deadly, and trying to kill Karou because of her association with her family of monsters. (So the scene where he watches her sleep has a much different vibe than Twilight's love-stalking. Akiva is just stalking-stalking.Which makes it...okay?)

It's difficult to remain objective about this series because I've heard so many raves about it from friends. The romance is suitably tortured and swoony, the action intriguing, and the side characters appealing (particularly Brimstone and his fellow chimeras). Karou's world is dark and fascinating: I particularly loved the Prague setting, and hope that the other worlds get more complex and fleshed-out in the next two books.

The backstory slowly unfolds and sheds light onto current events as well as the way Brimstone's creepy magic (which uses teeth to make wishes) works, and I'm intrigued to know what happens next. I'll certainly pick up Days of Blood & Starlight, and eagerly await Dreams of Gods & Monsters for 2014.

*Except Jesus. He's great.
**"My true form is approximately the size of your Chrysler Building."

Shadow and Bone

Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Grisha come for Alina when they realize she is one of them: powerfully gifted, and destined to help rid their land of the terrible darkness of the Unsea.

Alina grew up as a peasant in an orphanage with her best friend Mal before they both joined the army. She doesn't believe she has any magic, but the Darkling, leader of the elite magicians known as the Grisha, understands exactly what she is and how to increase her power. They take her far from Mal, who Alina is in love with, and into the unfamiliar opulence of the king's court.

Alina is soon plunged into Grisha training and the deeply entangled politics of the king's court, where the Darkling is the real power. Slowly, Alina begins to hope that she can help the Grisha heal a diseased portion of land called the Unsea, which is inhabited by flesh-eating monsters and divides the kingdom of Ravka in half.

Shadow and Bone is set in a fantasy version of feudal Russia, complete with a weakened royal family and a Rasputin-like adviser called the Apparat. There's plenty of adventure, some great romance, and a terrible threat in the form of the shadowy Unsea. It's an impressive first novel, and I've already bought the sequel, Siege and Storm, which comes out on June 4th. The final book is Ruin and Rising, scheduled for 2014.

Shadow and Bone adds to all the excellent fantasy being published today that stars strong and interesting heroines. (I'm in book heaven!) If you've read it and can't stand to wait for the sequels, check out these series in the meantime:

• Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor, which is set in Prague and features a blue-haired art student named Karou who sketches monsters.
• I loved Seraphina by Rachel Hartman, which has a strong medieval Europe setting and one of the coolest takes on dragons I've seen in a long time.
• For those looking for fantasy worlds that are non-European, try Eon (and its sequel Eona, which completes the story) by Alison Goodman. It's set in a fantasy version of China and Japan and has plot elements similar to Shadow and Bone. Plus, more dragons!
• Or for a book set in modern-day London that has cool magic, two fantastic male leads, and a series that's already complete, try The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud.