Immortal Academy: Year One

This book is quite different from others I have read in this genre, which is refreshing. I really enjoyed the idea behind this book of bringing together different immortals to one school. It was interesting all of the elements that are brought together in this book. This book did not really bring out any emotions for me as a reader. I did not find myself relating very closely to this book or the characters in it. The main character did not have any memory of her parents who she had lost, but it was not an emotional experience at all. Nor were there any deep rooted relationships torn apart throughout the book to bring out feelings in me. This was not an emotionally stirring book for me. I really enjoyed the description of the school around 90% when Jenna finally sees the school for what it really is and not the facade veiled over all of their eyes. This was really interesting. I loved the elements of Supernatural, the television series, in the book. I liked how the main character was obsessed with pie like Dean and how at the end (without giving away too much!) there is a wall put up in the mind to trap evil like Sam traps Lucifer in the show. I did notice the continued focus on the no cussing policy for the school. It felt a bit repetitive. I have zero issue with books without cussing, I actually quite enjoy them, but this book had cussing and kept focusing on how the main character should not be cussing or she would get in trouble. In my humble opinion, it would have been more encouraging if her cussing was not full on cussing and more of a play on bad words to further support the no cussing theme. I thought the idea of time travel and still recognizing someone on a deeper level was an interesting concept. Typically when time travel is involved it is quite finicky and other characters who are not sent back in time would not remember. However, it made more sense that the character would remember Jenna from the past that wasn’t altered, but erased from memory by the “bad guys”. I hope to find out more about Jenna’s godmother in year two. She is a briefly mentioned character who needs more time to explain everything she knows, which I anticipate is quite a bit. The book really began to peak with action around 85%, which leads me to believe the next book should continue to reveal more exciting revelations based on the build up in the beginning of book one. I would also really love to find out more about what exactly Jenna’s heritage is and how that will come to affect her role in the school. If I am being completely honest, I struggled with the word choices in this book. At the beginning, I caught on to the repetitive use of “dude”, “guy”, “chic”, and “girl” as a way to refer to the characters in the book outside of the dialogue. I found I couldn’t focus on anything else and I was bracing myself for the next “dude” reference in the writing. However, overall the flow of the book worked well and the story itself held my interest. I would certainly give another series of S.L. Morgan’s a read to compare her writing style from book to book. As I have stated in this review, the concept of her storyline was intriguing for this book and I anticipate her other books would be similar in their level of curiosity they bring about in me as a reader.