Review: "Daughter of Smoke & Bone" by Laini Taylor
Seventeen year old Karou is an art student with a very…interesting lifestyle. On the surface, she’s like any other girl – she has a best friend who accepts her even with all her quirks, an ex-boyfriend who’s constantly pursuing her, an impressive imagination that has her drawing monsters in her sketchbooks, a specific place she likes to eat at. Just from these parts of her life, she may seem ordinary…but then we have to take into account that she lives by herself, she has naturally blue hair, she’s constantly going on errands to collect teeth, and she speaks multiple different languages.
Oh, and the monsters she’s drawing in her sketchbooks may not be so imaginary. In fact, they may just be a part of a group she calls “family.”
To put it simply, Karou’s life isn’t so ordinary, but what others consider unreal and maddening, Karou considers normal…except the fact that she has no clue as to who she is.
That changes when she meets Akiva, one of many seraphim who pledge to kill the same kind of monsters that Karou has grown up with. At first confrontation the main focus for the two of them is the heat of battle, enemy versus enemy, but then something else passes between them and it’s something they can’t explain or ignore. Akiva may be the key to discovering who Karou really is, but is the truth worth knowing if it means splitting apart her world? The choice is hers to make.
Oh. My. Lord.
This book was absolutely fascinating. I’ve read and seen so many books about angels, vampires, werewolves…but this. This. This was something else. The author managed to use some of these elements we’ve seen in other books and has turned it into something extraordinary. The world she has created is original, entrancing, memorable, and oh so creative. There were so many things that worked for me in this novel.
The first thing I want to praise is the setting. That fact that it isn’t settled around America (or an English speaking country for that matter) and took place in Czech Republic had already made the book incredibly unique for me. The descriptions were vivid, the switching of perspectives was captivating, the separation of worlds was clearly defined. There was nothing cliché about this book, it seems so unusual compared to the other books in its category and that makes it all the most stunning.
Karou was such a joy throughout the book. She was strong but also lonely, daring but also uncertain. She wasn’t made of steel and she wasn’t purely weak which made her such a relatable and round character. Her humor was amusing and I loved her interactions with Zuzana. Despite all that was going on, they had such a deep friendship and their conversations always flowed so well and so effortless, as if they were meant to be best friends. Brimstone was quite an intriguing character with his lack of affection and acknowledgement, but was still able to have such a close kinship with Karou as he raised her. I felt so much depth in his character that went beyond words as the author so perfectly conveys. Akiva is a whole other story. He plays a much bigger role in Karou’s life than I had guessed and it is both tragic and beautiful. Although I have mixed feelings about insta-love, Karou and Akiva’s situation is quite unique. Originally, I thought it was unrealistic how drawn they were to each other but after finishing the story, it all makes sense.
So, the story starts off slow and a little confusing and because of that I wasn’t flying through the pages. When Karou meets Akiva the story starts picking up a bit and my curiosity as to who Karou is got so high it was driving me crazy. I love stories where a main character is trying to figure out more about themselves, especially if it’s their own identity, but I haven’t read many books with that element. This book not only had it, but it delivered. I was nearing the end of the book with all these scenarios in my head and the author was dropping hints left and right, but I couldn’t figure it out completely until the flashbacks started coming. The switching of perspectives I felt was shaky at times where I thought the author could have improved the transitions to avoid confusion and although I loved the romance, I felt like there was something missing. The flashbacks helped explain why Akiva ended up the way he was and why his love ran so deep, but I think there could have been more to it than what was explained. I’m not against the idea of falling in love at first sight, which kind of happened here, but I feel that there was too much of a rush into their romantic involvement. For Akiva to risk everything to go to the land of his enemies for someone who briefly helped him seemed a little much and could have been further flushed out. The ending was dramatic, but the epilogue after it took away from that while also bringing about more confusion.
Other than that, this book was a great read and I am without a doubt going to be continuing the series.
