Lake:Lake Smithson has everything a boy like him could ever want. Loving, adoptive parents and a brother who feels like his other half. So why does something inside him yearn for more? Fate has other plans for him. A tragic event obliterates his world, forcing him to find a reason to go on. His obsession to find the answers makes him question everything he has ever known and thrust him into a … him into a world that has hidden in plain sight for centuries.
Nova: Nova Rathers has always been looked down upon by those who are ‘gifted’. Determined to prove she can be more than her circumstances, she struggles to find a way to make a name for herself. Until an uninvited visitor makes their way to her world, setting off a chain reaction of events that go against her entire way of life. Leading her to make choices that could tear apart everything her people worked so hard to keep secret.
Joined by new friends, Lake and Nova attempt to piece together mysterious clues about what’s happening. Unfortunately, their hunt might lead them to something even more sinister. Something that could destroy everything that they have left.
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I received this book from NetGalley, but the opinions are all my own. Wow… what a unique story! I had no idea going in what I was getting into as the blurb was vague, but I’m so glad I gave it a chance. Lake and Nova were great main characters, definitely not mainstream, which I really appreciated. The magic theme with friendship and betrayal gave it an overall fantasy feel while it still felt modern and relatable. I believe it is a story the average person can say, “Hey, that could be me,” and I think that is important. It gets four stars from me.
I’ve received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review
(3,5 Stars)
Lake and Devlin are two inseparable step-brothers – a tragic death and a magic world hidden from the human eyes. After tragically losing his brother Lake discovers some letters in his brother’s room – privy letters that hide a dark secret. Trying to find his place in the world, after multiple rejections from the college, Lake tries everything in his power to find the truth behind his brother’s murder – even if his life is at stake.
This book has been very controversial for me, to say the least. On one hand, I really loved the plot and the idea behind it – GENIAL, but considering the book is very close to release (less than 3 months away) the book contains a lot of flaws that made it almost impossible for me to connect with any of the characters and to just lose myself on the story.
The story behind it is an amazing concept – unique I could say. It does resemble a little bit of “The Magicians” series, which the author even mentioned. I loved that series, so I loved the idea behind this. The world the author has built in the book was amazing, they had an academy where they learned about magic, sigils and magical objects, and old faerie magic. They also had monsters in the dark, coming from the pits of hell after the magical people.
I had issues connecting with the characters from more than just one point. The book was not consistent when comes to the storytelling, in more than one instance the book switched from 3rd to 1st person on the same sentence making it hard to keep up with the story. The jokes and funny moments, in the beginning, felt a little bit too forced like the author tried to make us love said character but on the next page we ended up hating said character.
The transition from one character speaking to another character wasn’t very smooth, there was more than one instance where I needed to re-read the last page to understand who’s speaking now. And one of my big issues was that the big events that took place in the character’s life didn’t actually make me feel anything. They felt a little bit too plain. I wanted to feel their emotions, their fear through my bones, to actually be scared of this book since it was a dark fantasy, but, unfortunately, it didn’t do it for me.
However, I liked the book had a lot of diversity when comes to the sexual orientation of the characters, everyone was different from many points of view and everyone was cool with it, they weren’t racist or homophobic. Some of the jokes towards the end of the book were really good and made me laugh. The ending of the book was actually really interesting and that’s when I got hooked and enjoyed it. I am curious about how this book series will continue and I do hope that the next book/s will be even better and improved than this one because the story and the whole concept is really amazing.
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I requested a review copy of this book and here’s my honest review.
This was a bit of a slow starter for me and took a bit to really get into it.
I can’t quite pinpoint exactly what Lake (m.c) wants other than to get into the magic school, which made it difficult to work out the plot for me.
Overall, it was an ok story, though I’m not sure I will read anymore of the series.