Ink of Blood

(This review may contain spoilers).

After having been drawn into the lives of several different characters, it was nice to have a return to Yelena. I particularly liked being able to see her interacting with Valek at the beginning of the book… even though I found that the book was really tense to start off with.

I really liked being able to see the characters I recognised from the previous books… and in particular Ari and Janco. I didn’t like the switching between third and first person, though. I found it particularly hard not to be pulled out of the story.

At the same time, it was interesting to see what was going on in both kingdoms. And I really liked seeing Valek’s past. It made him more of an interesting character and I couldn’t help feeling a lot of sympathy for him as a child. It was awful to read about his brothers being killed and I could definitely understand why he was so bent on revenge.

I didn’t much like Ambrose in this book. He seemed to be growing paranoid… and there were certain things that were revealed that made him seem really untrustworthy. I did find Onora to be an interesting character and it was good to note the similarities between her and Valek.

I thought it was good to see Yelena have to cope without her magic. While she didn’t come across as a weak character, I liked being able to see her have to come up with different ways of handling the situations she found herself in.

I really liked seeing the Sandseed horses and although it was disappointing not to see much communication from them, I felt that their intelligence came across really well. There was quite a bit about the politics in the two kingdoms and although there were a lot of different plotlines going on, I thought they all came together really well by the end.

I found this book really easy to read and although I would have liked to see more of Yelena and Valek together, it made sense that those scenes were few and far between. Janco made me laugh… although I did feel for him towards the end of the book. I didn’t get to see nearly enough of him and Ari, though… but I did enjoy seeing Opal and Devlen again, along with Leif and Mara.

(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).

(This review may contain spoilers).

Since I was given the opportunity to read one of the other books in this series with my niece, I did the same with this one.

It was good to note that the style was the same as the previous book I read. I liked the fact that the book addressed the reader directly and it was also good to see the pronunciations given for some of the words.

My niece was engaged while we were reading the book and enjoyed being asked some of the questions, though I think it would have been good to have some more details. She did like being able to learn some of the Italian words and there was quite a bit of information in the book that I myself hadn’t known.

I thought that the use of the pictures worked really well, although some of the pictures did make a few of the guesses obvious. Since there weren’t any answers in the back, though, I felt that worked particularly well.

It was good to be able to see something of the food people would eat in Italy and I found myself curious to try some of it… although there was other food mentioned I didn’t think I’d find so appetising.

There’s quite obviously been a lot of research gone into this book and although it’s probably a bit too juvenile for my niece, she still enjoyed being able to read it with me.

The book was good enough that I’d like to also read it with my nephew when he’s a little bit older. I felt the author did a really good job of sparking an interest in learning more about Italy. There were a lot of interesting facts and it’s a really good series of books. I think there could be some more information involved, but it works as a really good introduction with writing and pictures that engaged my niece and I felt it was written well.

I think that, in the future, it would be good to share other books in this series with my niece and my nephew, so that they can both get to know more details about other countries around the world and learn about more than just local places.

(This review may contain spoilers).

Having read the second book in this series, I was quite eager to read the first book in this series.

It was good to read about the characters I’d already grown to know. I found Mira an easy character to empathise with and although I didn’t like the fact that there was a love triangle, it didn’t irritate me so much… and her emotions towards the other characters came across really well.

I wasn’t really sure of what to make of Blue at first, but as the book went on, I felt able to understand him much more easily. It was interesting to see how he and the other teenagers had to deal with their cursed lives… though I have to say, seeing Viv in this book and how she was with Henley, I lost some of the sympathy I’d had for her in the sequel to this.

I liked Freddie’s character, even though I did think he was a bit too naive and innocent. It was good to meet his brothers and I was very intrigued by Caspian’s legend. Since they would presumably know how the story of the Little Mermaid ended, I found myself wondering how things would go with him.

It was really interesting to see glimpses of how damaged people were even after their curses had been ended. For instance, Gwen had a really awful time of it… so it was good to see that happily ever after maybe wasn’t so much happily ever after.

I do think there were some issues with this book. For instance, I felt that Mira’s intelligence was shown towards the beginning… but later on, she seemed really lacking there. And she didn’t seem to spare much thought towards her godmothers… not to mention the fact that, although I thought her feelings for Blue came across naturally, I couldn’t see any real love towards Felix.

I did think Jewel was a really interesting character and it was sad to read about the Match Girl… though at least she did get saved. It was good to see why Mira didn’t put two and two together, since I felt the brothers’ curse was obvious.

I do think there were some things that could have been changed about this book and I definitely wouldn’t recommend it for younger/more sensitive readers. But I did enjoy reading this and I would be interested in reading more books by this author in the future.

(This review may contain spoilers).

I had the chance to meet Max in the previous book, as well as earlier in the series as ‘the dragon in Sanctuary’. Although I didn’t know anything about his past (or remembered if I did), I enjoyed the opportunity to get to know him.

I really enjoyed the feeling of brotherhood that ran through this particular book, even where Falcyn was involved. I wanted to hate Seraphina and while I did at first, I did feel a lot of sympathy for her as I got to know her as a character and saw things from her perspective. However, I was glad to see that she knew and accepted what she’d done was wrong.

I was glad to see a return to humour with the characters like Fang, whose book had ruined him as a character. I loved seeing the banter between him and Fury especially… and there were some occasions I found myself laughing out loud.

I do think that the world’s grown a bit too big and confusing. While I knew the main characters reasonably well, there were constant changes in the scenes and POVs that confused me a bit. And I’m still not sure how Merlin (as a woman) fits into all of it.

There were a lot of really tense scenes in this book. I especially liked how Maxis interacted with his dragonets… and that they clearly wanted to meet him. I was very amused by the brother/sister banter that went on between them and it was obvious how much they cared for each other… and it was nice to see Maxis’ son have a sister who wanted to protect him.

I felt there were quite a few emotional scenes in this book and I was able to empathise with the two main characters really well. I did notice that there was one occasion where one of the characters were captured, but although they escaped, it wasn’t made clear how that happened, since the scene had ended with them helpless.

It was good to see how the tension between Arcadian and Katagaria started and I really didn’t like the King and how he treated the dragons he’d taken. I was a bit confused about the gallu demons and Apollo… but I’m now eager to read the next book and see what will happen with Illarion.