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Review

ABSOLUTELY FREAKING INCREDIBLE!!! 

Utterly and absolutely spellbounding, this isn’t a book, it’s an experience. And after I finished it, I sat clutching it to my chest, my heart pounding and just staring off into the distance, totally gobsmacked and shaking my head in awe of it all. Seriously, one of the most beautifully written, captivating books I have ever read!

“Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love.
It did not end well. “

It is the story of Karou, a 17 year old art student living in Prague. Blue haired and tattooed, she is constantly drawing in her sketchbook, which is full of mythical, fantastical creatures. What nobody realizes is, that these creatures are chimaera and are very much real, living in an alternate world, and they are Karou’s only family. She has been raised since infancy by Brimstone, a Wishmonger, and leads a secret life running errands for him in the human world, using portals to travel between his store, and cities all over the world, collecting teeth for him. But she has no idea why. In fact, she has no idea about anything – her past, her real family, the secret world of the chimaera, or her place in it.

“She had been innocent once, a little girl playing with feathers on the floor of a devil’s lair. She wasn’t innocent now, but she didn’t know what to do about it. This was her life: magic and shame and secrets and teeth and a deep, nagging hollow at the center of herself where something was most certainly missing.”

An amazing character, Karou is strong and brave, yet also vulnerable. She works so hard at leading her double life, and she takes it all in her stride, however everything changes following a chance encounter with the seraph, Akiva. Up until the point she sees him, she didn’t even know about the existence of seraphs, but their first interaction, and the cataclysmic consequences, leave Karou torn between the two worlds, one of which is in the middle of a centuries-old battle. And when the mysteriously intense and deliciously tormented Akiva reappears in her life, she finds that the answers to the secrets of the other world, and her existence, are finally within her reach.

“Humans have gotten glimpses of things over time … Just enough to make the rest up. It’s all a quilt of fairy tales with a patch here and there of truth.”

The story is mesmerizing and perfectly paced, with clues dropped here and there before the story shifts and the secret of Karou’s past and the mysteries of ‘Elsewhere’ slowly start to unfold. And the way that it is all woven in throughout the story is pure genius! There are enough answers to satisfy most of the questions that were zooming through my head while reading, but there are some threads left undone and a gutwrenching cliffhanger that will have me diving straight into book 2. It’s an intense read, but not too heavy, with moments of humour and lightness, and a beautifully developing love story.

“Your soul sings to mine. My soul is yours, and it always will be, in any world. No matter what happens-”. His voice cracked, and he took a breath. “I need you to remember that I love you.”

And the writing! OMG, the writing!!! It flows beautifully, and is so incredibly poetic. The descriptiveness is so lush, that you don’t just see it, you feel it, and it’s amazing! Not only the in mythical world that Taylor has created, but even Karou’s normal life – art school, coffee with a girlfriend, or walking through a foreign marketplace. You feel it all!

I cannot possibly gush enough about this book. It is an absolute gem, and one that I know I will read over and over again. I cannot wait for more. 6 sensational stars!

“Wishes are false. Hope is true. Hope makes it own magic.”

Daughter of Smoke and Bone Series