(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).
(This review may contain spoilers).
This was another book that made me think of books that I read as a child. I very much enjoyed reading this book and found it a really quick and easy read. It was a good fantasy and I liked the fact that there was a lot of world-building involved.
I thought it was good that the author took the time to introduce Josie as a character before she was thrust into the other world. I also liked the fact that she was dealing with some very real issues at home – her parents having problems, struggling with her older sister, and bullying.
It was really interesting to see the creatures and people that populated the world Josie found herself in. Although I would have liked to see more of an explanation from her Gran, it was nice to see that Josie didn’t just accept the new world straight away and questioned what was going on.
I felt that the prologue to this book did really well to set the scene, though it was a bit darker than the rest proved to be. There were hints that Zarek was a more well-rounded character than he first appeared to be, but I felt his motives and past weren’t as explored as they could have been and that it would have been good to find out exactly why he’d become the way he did, since it was only shown from another character’s perspective.
I liked the griffon in this book and it was good to see the world and how everything fit together. I also liked how the pendant worked to help Josie understand the language – it was a good way of solving that barrier and something that not many books deal with.
I felt this book was a really good introduction to the trilogy, although I did also feel that there were times the phrasing came across a bit clunky. Nothing major, but some of it was just a bit awkward to read… though that could have been style choice more than anything else.
I’m sure that, given the opportunity in the future, I would read the next two books in the trilogy. I’d like to see more of Josie and the friends she made.