Book Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone
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Daughter of Smoke and Bone is a sweeping, masterful blend of fantasy and romance designed to enthrall
Seventeen-year-old Karou is for all outwardly appearances just an art student with a penchant for drawing fantastic creatures that seem to have emerged straight out of a story book. But the blue-haired, polyglot, master in martial arts, strange tattoos et all, orphan is a mystery to everyone who knows her. Her friends have come to accept her mysterious absences, when Karou disappears because she has to “run errands.” And she is too, only, it is for a monstrous creature called Brimstone who lives in Elsewhere — a different world which can be accessed through innumerable portals — across the world. And the errands happen to be anything from smuggling elephant tusks to buying teeth from grave robbers.
Even as she is plagued by the notions that she isn’t “whole” and a burning curiosity to know how she came to be in the keeping of Brimstone and the other inhuman creatures called chimera, who have raised her, Karou has managed to keep her two lives in balance. Until the doors to Elsewhere have been closed and she is face-to-face with the enemy. An enemy that feels like a friend and more. An enemy who makes her feel “whole.” Slowly, each of the mysteries surrounding her life begin to unveil – with consequences both rewarding and devastating. Forced into a tug-of-war between angels and demons, compelled to choose between a dangerous alliance and a heartbreaking betrayal, what will Karou do? You’ll have to find out in the Daughter of Smoke and Bone.
Liani Taylor’s first book in the trilogy, Daughter of Smoke and Bone is enchanting. As is the mark of good fantasy fiction, it’s much too easy to follow Karou into her world, the streets of Prague untouched by time, its “medieval cobbles once trod by golems and mystics. And houses embellished with Rococo plasterwork and capped in roofs of red.” Her characters are imagined in rich detail, her turn of phrase beautifully eloquent, it’s a book that’s finished before you realise it.
A tale of breathtakingly beautiful angels and awe-inspiring beasts, star-crossed lovers and infallible heroes, is it any wonder, we can’t wait for Days of Blood and Starlight?
Name: Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Author: Laini Taylor
Pages: 432
Publisher: Hachette
Category: Books
About the Author (Author Profile)
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