sevenstories’ #CBR4 Review #24: Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

“In general, Karou has managed to keep her two lives in balance. On the one hand, she’s a seventeen-year-old art student in Prague; on the other, errand-girl to a monstrous creature who is the closest thing she has to family. Raised half in our world, half in ‘Elsewhere’, she has never understood Brimstone’s dark work – buying teeth from hunters and murderers – nor how she came into his keeping. She is a secret even to herself, plagued by the sensation that she isn’t whole. Now the doors to Elsewhere are closing, and Karou must choose between the safety of her human life and the dangers of a war-ravaged world that may hold the answers she has always sought.”

Despite have similarities to many popular books at the moment, Daughter of Smoke and Bone manages to be a really unique and unusual book. The brilliant heroine and break away from vampires and werewolves to more unfamiliar and imaginative characters and worlds makes this stand apart from its supernatural romance counterparts. Not necessarily a favourite, but a really solid, well written, and highly enjoyable read with a twist that I didn’t work out for a satisfyingly long portion of the book.  Whilst I didn’t reach the end desperately frustrated that I couldn’t read the next instalment immediately, I will definitely be having a read at some point when it is published. I didn’t love it overwhelmingly, the way many readers seem to have reacted to it, but I really enjoyed it and would recommend it as a high quality entry in the supernatural romance genre.

You can read the full review on my blog.

First Line: ‘Walking to school over the snow-muffled cobbles, Karou had no sinister premonitions about the day.’