The Daughter of Smoke & Bone Trilogy is composed by three books: Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Days of Blood and Starlight, Dreams of Gods and Monsters. From master storyteller and National Book Award finalist Laini Taylor comes a sweeping and gorgeously written modern fantasy series about a forbidden love, an ancient and epic war and hope for a world remade.
My Rating: 4.9/5
Genres: Urban Fantasy, Young-Adult
Read from September 5 to 16, 2014
Read from September 5 to 16, 2014
First published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Review for Each Book in Seperate:
Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.
In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.
And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherworldly war.
Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real, she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands", she speaks many languages - not all of them human - and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.
When beautiful, haunted Akiva fixes fiery eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?
My Rating: 5/5
Read from September 5 to 6, 2014
Read from September 5 to 6, 2014
My Review:
“ The streets of Prague were a fantasia scarcely touched by the
twenty-first century—or the twentieth or nineteenth, for that matter. It was a
city of alchemists and dreamers, its medieval cobbles once trod by golems,
mystics, invading armies. Tall houses glowed goldenrod and carmine and eggshell
blue, embellished with Rococo plasterwork and capped in roofs of uniform red.
Baroque cupolas were the soft green of antique copper, and Gothic steeples
stood ready to impale fallen angels. The wind carried the memory of magic,
revolution, violins, and the cobbled lanes meandered like creeks. Thugs wore
Mozart wigs and pushed chamber music on street corners, and marionettes hung in
windows, making the whole city seem like a theater with unseen puppeteers
crouched behind velvet. ”
When I first saw Daughter of Smoke &Bone in Goodreads, I made the mistake to judge the book by its cover (the original cover). I wasn't enthralled, the exact opposite - I wanted to avoid another teenage romance book worth maximum 3 rating stars. Halfheartedly, it made it to my Want-To-Read- List. So, without any expectations and armed with patience, I started reading it.
One day later:
One day later:
First of all, the Laini Taylor is an authoring genius. Karou's portrait was mystifying, her sketches were clearly displayed before me and all the urban landscapes were enchanting and creepy at the same time. The ending was pitch-perfect, the romance perfectly balanced and each relationship between the characters rang true. Above all though, is that this story is brand new and has nothing to do with any other you might have read until now. Finally!
P.S: This is a book trailer I found in YouTube. Enjoy :)
2. Days of Blood and Starlight
Once upon a time, an angel and a devil held a wishbone between them.
And it's snap split the world in two.
And it's snap split the world in two.
Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love and dared to imagine a new way of living - one without massacres an torn throats and bonfires of the fallen, without revenants or bastard armies or children ripped from their mother's arms to take their turn in the killing and the dying.
Once, the lovers lay entwined in the moon's secret temple and dreamed of a world that was like a jewel-box without a jewel - a paradise waiting for them to find it and fill it with their happiness.
This was not that world.
My Rating: 5/5
Once, the lovers lay entwined in the moon's secret temple and dreamed of a world that was like a jewel-box without a jewel - a paradise waiting for them to find it and fill it with their happiness.
This was not that world.
My Rating: 5/5
Read from September 6 to 10, 2014
My Review:
Days of Blood and Starlight is even better than the other two books in the series. It's not a "filler" between the first and the last book, as it usually happens in trilogies, but a masterpiece on its own.
This book was delightfully slow, with griping sensations of betrayal and pain, but you could feel hope too, because Karou never lost hope. There was cold-blooded violence that never became gory or tiring - every feeling in this book is carefully measured to never be overwhelming or absent. All, except for love whitch was almost nonexistent, and that's what enthralled me most of all - it's absence was what made Karou's dark night of the soul that much real.
Another fact i absolutely LOVED and admired, is that through Akiva's eyes I got to see Eretz and the empire, which is exactly like I imagined it - a metaphor of the Roman empire, with all its glory, royalty and filth.
Again, Its ending was masterfully written and it made me start Dreams of Gods and Monsters right after I was finished.
Days of Blood and Starlight is even better than the other two books in the series. It's not a "filler" between the first and the last book, as it usually happens in trilogies, but a masterpiece on its own.
This book was delightfully slow, with griping sensations of betrayal and pain, but you could feel hope too, because Karou never lost hope. There was cold-blooded violence that never became gory or tiring - every feeling in this book is carefully measured to never be overwhelming or absent. All, except for love whitch was almost nonexistent, and that's what enthralled me most of all - it's absence was what made Karou's dark night of the soul that much real.
Another fact i absolutely LOVED and admired, is that through Akiva's eyes I got to see Eretz and the empire, which is exactly like I imagined it - a metaphor of the Roman empire, with all its glory, royalty and filth.
Again, Its ending was masterfully written and it made me start Dreams of Gods and Monsters right after I was finished.
3. Dreams of Gods and Monsters
By a way of staggering deception, Karou has taken control of the chimaera rebellion and is intent on steering its course away from dead-end vengeance. The future rest on her, if there can ever be a future for the chimaera in war-revenged Eretz.
Common enemy, common cause.
When Jael's brutal seraph army trespasses into the human world, the unthinkable becomes essential and Karou and Akiva must align their enemy armies against the threat. Its a twisted version of their long-ago dream, and they begin to hope that it might forge a way forward for their people.
And perhaps, for themselves. Toward a new way of living, and maybe even love.
But there are bigger threats than Jael in the offing. A vicious queen is hunting Akiva and, in the skies of Eretz... Something is happening. Massive stains are spreading like bruises from horizon to horizon; The great winged stormhunters are gathering as if summoned, carelessly circling, and a deep sense of wrong pervades the world.
What power can bruise the sky?
From the streets of Rome to the caves of the Kirin and beyond, humans, chimaera and seraphim will fight, strive, love and die in an epic theater that transcends good and evil, right and wrong, friend and enemy.
At the very barriers of space and time, what do gods and monsters dream of? And does anything else matter?
My Rating: 4.7/5
Read from September 10 to 16, 2014
My Review:
I am selfishly glad that this book wasn't as flawless as the other two, though it was heart-shattering on its own way. Laini Taylor is still a genius, and this trilogy I liked more that any other I have ever read.
The only things that did cost the 0.3 rating star of the absolute perfection, where the following: its tiring length and a new character named Elisa - she had a bizarre background.
What amazes me in total, is that Laini made use of the biblical seraph's appearance and the term "Fallen", but built a whole new worldview with its own limitations and abilities.
Personally I am not religious but in order to not be, I have read tons of books about religions of our wold.That's why most fantasy books about angels I find boring and a bit offset, as enjoyable as a kid's fantasies. This book though had it's own cosmogony and it felt fresh and mystifying. Just, BRAVO Laini!
What will I do now that this trilogy is over?
THE CHARACTERS:
Karou has no remembrance of biological parents, all she knows is that Brimstone and his helpers brought her up. She collects teeth for brimstone and in exchange he gives her coins - make a wish, snap the coin and it will come true - as Karou did and her hair became blue. Her exterior is human and pretty and her eyes are black as a swan's. She is a skilled fighter, as she enrolled in several classes of martial arts.
She is strong-willed, patient and unusually mature for her age. Even though she has a taste for revenge she has her moments of forgiveness. She also has a certain look which she wears when she tells the truth, but wants to make it sound like a lie - something that Zuzana (her best friend) falls for every single time.
Compared to her previous self (back when she used to be Akiva's beloved one) she is much less naive and almost fearless. Although she gives the impression that she is cold and distant, she is very capable of loving others and she can be blinded by her loyalty - which makes me feel that her shaft is delicate after all.
Akiva is an angel, emissary of a military class called "Misbegotten". The Misbegotten, boy and girls alike, are bastard children of the emperor. He never knew his mother, as she used to be a concumbine in Joram's -the emperor's- harem. He was seperated from her in the age of five, and grew up together with Liraz, his half-sister, and Hazael, his half-brother.
He has a tendency towards being rebellius and independant, a flame which came to life when he met Madrigal, a Chimaera from the tribe of Kirin. As their factions were enemies, they were forced to share their love in secret and dream of a world where Chimaera and Angels could live happily together. When he lost Madrigal to a terrible treachery, he became cold and cruel. Participating in the ongoing war between Angels and Chimaera, he unleashed hell in the enemy's ranks, without knowing that his beloved one was embodied in Karou.
Throughout the series, Karou makes Akiva face the burden of his actions. Knowing that Madrigal - aka Karou - is alive, his fiery self rekindles and sees the war through changed eyes.
Thiago is the son of the Chimaera's Warlord, his origins being of a tribe called Hartkind. He, though, being vain and eccentric, made a pact with Brimstone and was resurrected several times in a muscular body, human from the thighs up, and the legs of a white wolf down below. His face is that of a handsome man, with cold gray eyes. He has white, well-combed hair down to his back.
Thiago is an exeptionally good warrior, in high rank and multiply honored. He wears white, in order to let his victims' blood flash red in contrast. Rumors say that he rips open the Angels' throats with his canine teeth, making him feared and respected among the chimaera.
Back in the day, before Madrigal had met Akiva, he used to have a fling for her. When Madrigal's and Akiva's treacherous relationship was uncovered, he himself sentenced Madrigal to eternal death and mercilessly tortured Akiva.
In Days of Blood and Starlight, Karou and Thiago are forced to coexist in order to build an army. Karou thinks that Thiago has feelings for her, as he used to have for Madrigal.
In the end, Thiago meets his sentence by Karou's own hand - because his feelings proved foul, and his motives under which he led his army proved even worse.
Ziri is a chimaera of Kirin origin, same as Madrigal used to be. Currently, he is the only survivor of the Kirin race and one of the few Chimaera who still wear the body they were born into. Ziri, in the age of twelve, used to have feelings for Madrigal and was the only one who had tried to save her from her terrible fate.
Liraz is the first one to observe how graceful a warrior he is, when she watches him battle with a legion of Angels. Helped by Akiva, he returns back to the Chimaera base, where his healing process brings him closer with Karou. Ziri slowly builds feelings for her too, and his loyalties are transferred to her. When Karou's darkest hour arrives, he is beside her and agrees to claim a fate he would never ask for, risking to be caught and punished in the worst way.
Karou describes his soul as the wind that blows in the Kirin mountains, light, pure and unique. He is sweet tempered and unselfish to the core.
Liraz
Liraz is Akiva's and Hazael's half sister. Like Akiva, she does not remember her mother at all, so the only family she has left is her two brothers. She is afraid of her feelings, and not being able to even recognise them, she pretends they don't exist. She is a merciless warrior, with hands covered in black ink, one skar for each life she has taken. Her hair is braided in tight little braids and she has common blue eyes.
When Akiva choses Karou over his siblings, Liraz is enraged and even tries to kill her. She believes that all she has in the world is her brothers and she has to keep them alive, safe, and ofcourse, with her.
Her selfish point of view changes when she faces a terrible loss, strong enough that she falls on her knees and pleases Karou to save her kin. When the "fake" Thiago saves her from certain death, strange and infuriating feelings start kreeping through her wall of ice, all for that anonymous soul that hides behind those pale gray eyes.
[SPOILER] In the end, Karou and Liraz become friends, and Liraz is safe and happy and in love. [End of Spoiler]
Brimstone
Brimstone is sometimes described as the "Old Devil", which is quite a fitting name as his depiction is close to that of Amun, the Egyptian God. Amun was the god of creation, and Brimstone masters the unique art of Resurrection - he is all that keeps the chimaera race together, fearless and alive. Brimstone had once taught Madrigal how to give new bodies to the fallen warriors of the Chimaera and when Karou broke the wishbone, the memories of her past self's resurrection lessons became hers.
While Brimstone was still alive, Karou doubted that he loved her, but when the ghastly thing happened Karou found out that Brimstone had made provisions so that she would never find herself in need. Since that, Karou never found herself doubting his motives again. He was more than a father to her, and she always kept his incorruptible memory in her heart .
Common enemy, common cause.
When Jael's brutal seraph army trespasses into the human world, the unthinkable becomes essential and Karou and Akiva must align their enemy armies against the threat. Its a twisted version of their long-ago dream, and they begin to hope that it might forge a way forward for their people.
And perhaps, for themselves. Toward a new way of living, and maybe even love.
But there are bigger threats than Jael in the offing. A vicious queen is hunting Akiva and, in the skies of Eretz... Something is happening. Massive stains are spreading like bruises from horizon to horizon; The great winged stormhunters are gathering as if summoned, carelessly circling, and a deep sense of wrong pervades the world.
What power can bruise the sky?
From the streets of Rome to the caves of the Kirin and beyond, humans, chimaera and seraphim will fight, strive, love and die in an epic theater that transcends good and evil, right and wrong, friend and enemy.
At the very barriers of space and time, what do gods and monsters dream of? And does anything else matter?
My Rating: 4.7/5
Read from September 10 to 16, 2014
My Review:
I am selfishly glad that this book wasn't as flawless as the other two, though it was heart-shattering on its own way. Laini Taylor is still a genius, and this trilogy I liked more that any other I have ever read.
The only things that did cost the 0.3 rating star of the absolute perfection, where the following: its tiring length and a new character named Elisa - she had a bizarre background.
What amazes me in total, is that Laini made use of the biblical seraph's appearance and the term "Fallen", but built a whole new worldview with its own limitations and abilities.
Personally I am not religious but in order to not be, I have read tons of books about religions of our wold.That's why most fantasy books about angels I find boring and a bit offset, as enjoyable as a kid's fantasies. This book though had it's own cosmogony and it felt fresh and mystifying. Just, BRAVO Laini!
What will I do now that this trilogy is over?
THE CHARACTERS:
- Karou:
She is strong-willed, patient and unusually mature for her age. Even though she has a taste for revenge she has her moments of forgiveness. She also has a certain look which she wears when she tells the truth, but wants to make it sound like a lie - something that Zuzana (her best friend) falls for every single time.
Compared to her previous self (back when she used to be Akiva's beloved one) she is much less naive and almost fearless. Although she gives the impression that she is cold and distant, she is very capable of loving others and she can be blinded by her loyalty - which makes me feel that her shaft is delicate after all.
- Akiva:
He has a tendency towards being rebellius and independant, a flame which came to life when he met Madrigal, a Chimaera from the tribe of Kirin. As their factions were enemies, they were forced to share their love in secret and dream of a world where Chimaera and Angels could live happily together. When he lost Madrigal to a terrible treachery, he became cold and cruel. Participating in the ongoing war between Angels and Chimaera, he unleashed hell in the enemy's ranks, without knowing that his beloved one was embodied in Karou.
Throughout the series, Karou makes Akiva face the burden of his actions. Knowing that Madrigal - aka Karou - is alive, his fiery self rekindles and sees the war through changed eyes.
- Thiago
Thiago is the son of the Chimaera's Warlord, his origins being of a tribe called Hartkind. He, though, being vain and eccentric, made a pact with Brimstone and was resurrected several times in a muscular body, human from the thighs up, and the legs of a white wolf down below. His face is that of a handsome man, with cold gray eyes. He has white, well-combed hair down to his back.Thiago is an exeptionally good warrior, in high rank and multiply honored. He wears white, in order to let his victims' blood flash red in contrast. Rumors say that he rips open the Angels' throats with his canine teeth, making him feared and respected among the chimaera.
Back in the day, before Madrigal had met Akiva, he used to have a fling for her. When Madrigal's and Akiva's treacherous relationship was uncovered, he himself sentenced Madrigal to eternal death and mercilessly tortured Akiva.
In Days of Blood and Starlight, Karou and Thiago are forced to coexist in order to build an army. Karou thinks that Thiago has feelings for her, as he used to have for Madrigal.
In the end, Thiago meets his sentence by Karou's own hand - because his feelings proved foul, and his motives under which he led his army proved even worse.
- Ziri
Ziri is a chimaera of Kirin origin, same as Madrigal used to be. Currently, he is the only survivor of the Kirin race and one of the few Chimaera who still wear the body they were born into. Ziri, in the age of twelve, used to have feelings for Madrigal and was the only one who had tried to save her from her terrible fate.Liraz is the first one to observe how graceful a warrior he is, when she watches him battle with a legion of Angels. Helped by Akiva, he returns back to the Chimaera base, where his healing process brings him closer with Karou. Ziri slowly builds feelings for her too, and his loyalties are transferred to her. When Karou's darkest hour arrives, he is beside her and agrees to claim a fate he would never ask for, risking to be caught and punished in the worst way.
Karou describes his soul as the wind that blows in the Kirin mountains, light, pure and unique. He is sweet tempered and unselfish to the core.
Liraz
When Akiva choses Karou over his siblings, Liraz is enraged and even tries to kill her. She believes that all she has in the world is her brothers and she has to keep them alive, safe, and ofcourse, with her.
Her selfish point of view changes when she faces a terrible loss, strong enough that she falls on her knees and pleases Karou to save her kin. When the "fake" Thiago saves her from certain death, strange and infuriating feelings start kreeping through her wall of ice, all for that anonymous soul that hides behind those pale gray eyes.
[SPOILER] In the end, Karou and Liraz become friends, and Liraz is safe and happy and in love. [End of Spoiler]
Brimstone
While Brimstone was still alive, Karou doubted that he loved her, but when the ghastly thing happened Karou found out that Brimstone had made provisions so that she would never find herself in need. Since that, Karou never found herself doubting his motives again. He was more than a father to her, and she always kept his incorruptible memory in her heart .
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: If you don't have a google account, you can always email me at demetra.is.blogging@gmail.com and leave me a private comment. Comments that are irrelevant to the subject of the post will not be published.