*** WARNING: BEWARE! SPOILERS BELOW!! ***
Eliyana is used to the shadows. With a birthmark covering half her face, she just hopes to graduate high school unscathed. That is, until Joshua hops a fence and changes her perspective. No one, aside from her mother, has ever treated her like he does: normal. Maybe even beautiful. Because of Joshua, Eliyana finally begins to believe she could be loved. But one night her mother doesn’t come home, and that’s when everything gets weird. Now Joshua is her new, and rather reluctant, legal Guardian. Add a hooded stalker and a Central Park battle to the mix and you’ve gone from weird to otherworldly. Eliyana soon finds herself in a world much larger and more complicated than she’s ever known. A world enslaved by a powerful and vile man. And Eliyana holds the answer to defeating him. How can an ordinary girl, a blemished girl, become a savior when she can’t even save herself?
Amazon.com
★★★★☆
Eliyana is just a couple weeks away from her eighteenth birthday when she tragically loses her mother, Elizabeth, in a structure fire. Not quite of age, her welfare is strangely left in the hands of best friend and next door neighbor, Joshua, who is only 21 himself. Eliyana has always struggled with fitting in, mostly because of a noticeable facial birthmark covering an entire half of her face. When Joshua came into her life he was the first person (aside from her mother) to treat her normally, dare we say even considered her pretty? But how is he supposed to be the legal guardian to someone so close to his own age? In just a matter of hours, El learns that that question is the least of her worries.
A couple nights after her mother's funeral, El is persuaded to indulge in a night out with a friend. That night turns dangerous when a potential stalking turns into a definite kidnapping. In an attempt to escape, El is caught up in a mess of confusing, questionable sights, one being that of her mother! Turns out that whole death scene was a ruse to protect El. Just as Eliyana is trying to comprehend her mother NOT being dead, Elizabeth is kidnapped. Joshua pops up to explain to El and the reader just what all is going on.
Long story short: Josh is a member of the League of Guardians for one of seven Reflections or alternate realities accessible through Thresholds (think: portal). He was specifically assigned to protect Eliyana as she has something special about her that His Sovereignty, Jasyn Crowe, very much wants. Crowe is a servant of The Void, essence of all evil within The Reflections (something like Star Wars' "The Dark Side"). The Guardians are collectively trying to battle this by recruiting dedicated servants of The Verity (all that is truth, light and goodness). In this battle of good vs. evil, or Era of Shadows as Joshua calls it, Eliyana's birthmark indicates that she may have a most powerful role at the heart of it all. What turns out to be one of the biggest challenges for El is Joshua himself. He acts like a completely different person within this alternate reality El is thrust into... a man that is inexplicably cold and distant. In fact, he transfers the duty of protecting El to a fellow Guardian, Kyaphus (Ky). Multiple times, Ky tries to break it to El that maybe Joshua's "friendship" was just him doing his job but El can't let herself believe that. She's convinced there's more there, just ... for some reason Joshua is forcing himself to deny it. One way or another, she'll have to choose who honestly has her best interests in mind before it's too late to turn back.
There were some things I noticed at the beginning of this novel that had me saying "uh oh, not another one..." Most noticeably, I spotted A LOT of elements that I've seen in various fantasy movies, tv shows and novels in recent years. Sprinkles of Once Upon A Time here and there... at times it felt like I could almost imagine Sara Ella's DVR line up. I'm not saying anything was directly lifted, I'm just saying if you're a fan of the genre, there is a ton of stuff here that you're likely to quickly recognize. First off was the similarities to The Never Ending Story: 1) mother dies 2) teased kid in this world becomes hero in alternate world 3) The Void = The Nothing >>> El has to find vessel of Verity to save world from The Void = Atreyu & Bastian have to stop the spread of the Nothing. Step away from Never Ending Story and you still see likenesses to Star Wars (especially when it came to that almost awkward link between Ky and El... Clueless-esque awkward). El transporting from NYC to the Reflection where she thinks her mother was taken = very 10th Kingdom. Even the tense triangle between Joshua, El and Ky was reminiscent of the Edward, Bella, Jacob business from Twilight -- there's even a blink-and-you-might-miss-it reference to one of the Twilight films. Oh and btw, I myself am totally team Ky throughout this whole book.
A jagged surface doesn't always allude to what truly lies beneath.
So, given that I was spotting all these similarities, I was concerned that this was just going to be a sloppy rehashing of popular fantasy plots from the past. Good news though! This one is a little shaky in the early portions but gets REALLY good after Act III! All the characters here are dynamic with great personalities (healthy doses of snark included) that keep the story moving at a fun pace. While the plot itself can get a little muddled and murky at times, I do think Sara Ella developed her characters admirably well, giving them all noticeable yet reasonable amounts of individual growth... some towards the light, others going dark... as it should be if you want your reader to get heavily invested! ;-)
Peer beyond the surface; you may find there a rose...
As for our protagonist, El, I liked her personality for the majority of the story. My one gripe with her is how she would persistently knock any meat-eater she came across yet she proudly rocked UGG boots. Weirdly though, her harping on this topic seemed to stop halfway through the book... guess everyone just got so caught up in the battle of good and evil there was no longer any time for meal breaks!
So if you're all about any of those stories I mentioned above: Never Ending Story, Star Wars, Twilight, The 10th Kingdom, etc... or if you want to just dip a reading toe into the fantasy genre pool, definitely try out this one.
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Eliyana Ember doesn’t believe in true love. Not anymore. After defeating her grandfather and saving the Second Reflection, El only trusts what’s right in front of her. The tangible. The real. Not some unexplained Kiss of Infinity she once shared with the ghost of a boy she’s trying to forget. She has more important things to worry about—like becoming queen of the Second Reflection, a role she is so not prepared to fill. Now that the Verity is intertwined with her soul and Joshua’s finally by her side, El is ready to learn more about her mysterious birth land, the land she now rules. So why does she feel like something—or someone—is missing? When the thresholds begin to drain and the Callings, those powerful magical gifts, begin to fail, El wonders if her link to Ky Rhyen may have something to do with it. For light and darkness cannot coexist. She needs answers before the Callings disappear altogether. Can El find a way to sever her connection to Ky and save the Reflections—and keep herself from falling for him in the process?
Amazon.com
★★★☆☆
*NOTE: This is a continuation of a series, so we have some spoiler-y material down below. Click away now if you haven't read the first book and don't want spoilers!
But if you have read the first book, then you know that when we last visited this trio -- Eliyana, Joshua, and Ky -- Joshua was pushing to make things official with Eliyana ("El") and Ky took off to try to track down his missing sister, leaving a big question mark around the feelings that had been building between him and El throughout the first novel.
Now here we are in the second installment. Unraveling opens with Ky still gone, and Eliyana preparing to take the throne as the new ruler of the Second Reflection (modern day NYC serves as Third Reflection, with portals between the realms). Joshua is still around, attentive to Eliyana though there IS still something about his motives that feels questionable. El continually tries to convince herself that Joshua is the right man for her but in her quietest, most honest moments she can't deny that something between them feels off. She also can't shake off persistent thoughts of Ky, endlessly wondering of his welfare & whereabouts.
If you, like me, were solidly Team Ky during the entirety of Book 1, no worries! Your guy is back! But it does take time for his story to come to the forefront. While the traditional chapter format is used to alternate between the voices of El and Josh, Ky's chapters (in his voice) are shorter and simply marked "Aside". But from them, we do learn what he's been up to since the close of Book 1 and that he's picked up the ability to read El's mind, even from a distance, which at first spooks her, then annoys her to no end until she ultimately accepts, even comes to appreciate it, seeing that it only goes to illustrate just how closely their souls are bound to each other. But what of that pesky Kiss of Infinity... was it Josh or Ky that got the TRUE binding kiss? That's El's big inner question for the first half of this second book.
The other big mystery is the Callings. Something is making the various Callings (powers people of the Realms are either born with or come into) diminish or die off altogether. Also, the Thresholds (portals) between the Reflections (realms) are weakening, leaving people to fear that they will be trapped in one Reflection or another for all eternity if the Thresholds completely shut down. El journeys all over creation, desperately seeking the answer to this mystery, hoping she'll find the solution before it's too late.
Finding myself such a big fan of the first book, this sequel immediately went on my mental anticipated releases list once I heard it was in the works! Once I finished Unraveling, I checked out online reviews out of curiosity. Seeing page after page of 4 and 5 star reviews, I just had to accept I was clearly going to have to be in the minority on this one. Let me be clear, I didn't hate this book, but MAN, was it a disappointment compared to the first book!
It started off promising. The action was there early on -- we have someone dead by Chapter 2 already! -- but El, what happened to you, girl?! Unraveling, indeed! You went from being fun and quirky in Unblemished to whiny and obnoxious here! El just keeps re-hashing the same questions -- almost verbatim each time, I might add -- OVER. AND. OVER. AGAIN. El's inner monologue seems to be chock full of endless questions. I found myself wishing El had a little bit more "warrior chick" to her personality in this story. She likes to TRY to assert herself from time to time -- "I am your queen!" -- but she doesn't have the presence to back it up. She seems to rely too much on everyone else to give her a direction to go in, her own mind too busy being too busy coming up with the next pop culture reference.
That's likely what killed a lot of the story here for me. The strength of the novel as a whole gets ruined by what feels like author Sara Ella's insistence on pandering to the younger members of the millennial crowd -- for example, ending a sentence with " #nojoke ", or incorporating such cringe-inducing analogies as "shake it off Taylor Swift style." Blech. And the song references. THE SONG REFERENCES. Starts off a few here and there. Then suddenly it's EVERY FEW PAGES. Sara Ella tries to get away with it by writing in that Eliyana thinks in song lyrics but sorry, some of those references felt awfully forced.
I get that everyone in our trio here fall between the ages of 17-23, so to some extent, writing in that style can be expected. My gripe is that it is most definitely overdone. Additionally, the plot in this second book suffers the double shot of having plot or character minutiae overly detailed while unfortunately being not nearly as entertaining and taut as the adventure readers were given in Unblemished. In the interest of full disclosure, I'll add that part of me (interest-wise) tapped out once the personal connection between Ky and Joshua was revealed. It struck me as a very soap-opera path to go down, which certainly didn't help my already floundering attention.
There just weren't enough surprises for me in the plot as a whole. About the only things that caught me off guard were 1) the scene with the coral caves -- THAT was inventive! 2) the danger Khloe got into near the end of the book... but then, evil IS so often seeking the innocent, isn't it?
So if I had such problems with this plot how did it still get three stars outta me? Well, because there were things about it that I did, in fact, find myself enjoying a good bit. I do still like the character Ky, even if his love El grated on me during this part of their journey. {At one point Ky tells El, "You will always be enough for me," which is sweet... definitely something one always likes to hear out of a loved one... but as the reader, ol' El wasn't quite enough for me.}
I also quite enjoyed seeing the evolution of the sisterly bond between Eliyana and Ebony. Who doesn't love seeing progressive maturity in characters as a story unfolds over time, right? :-) For those elements, I am still invested in this series and will happily try out the conclusion due to come out next year.
I noticed that in her author acknowledgements page, Sara Ella gave a shout-out to "author friend" Mary Weber, who penned the Storm Siren Trilogy. I wonder if Weber weighed in on plot brainstorming sessions at all. If so, this actually gives me hope in a way, because I had much the same issue with that trilogy -- absolutely adored the first book, was sorta meh about the second, came back once again really enjoying the 3rd and last book. I look forward to seeing if I have a similar result with the conclusion of the Unblemished series....
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Eliyana Ember is a reluctant queen. As vessel of the Verity—the purest of souls—only she can lead the fight against the wicked magnetism of the Void. If she fails, the paths between Reflections will cease to exist, and those she loves will remain plagued by darkness. After falling through a draining Threshold and suffering near-death, Eliyana awakens to a Shadowalker-ridden Venice, Italy. From there, she must learn to navigate mysteries of time and space. Traveling across the seven Reflections, Eliyana seeks one thing: the demise of the Void. But something else is at stake—the fate of her heart. Kyaphus Rhyen and Joshua David, brothers in arms, duel to win her hand. Ky remains ensnared and tortured by the Void. Joshua, though well-meaning, harbors dark secrets. Meanwhile, Eliyana finds herself torn, her mind and memories leading her in one direction, but her heart pulling her toward a man she knows she shouldn’t trust. How can she discern whom to believe when she cannot even depend on her own fragmented memories?
Amazon.com
★★☆☆☆
*NOTE: This is a continuation of a series, so we have some spoiler-y material down below. Click away now if you haven't read the first book and don't want spoilers!
Eliyana is now queen of the Second Reflection and vessel for The Verity. As such, she prepares herself and her kingdom for leading an attack against The Void. She survives a fall through a Threshold that nearly kills her (attempting to suck her life force out), awakening in Venice, Italy to find the place full of Shadowalkers. From Venice, Eliyana begins a journey that takes her across the Seven Reflections, gathering info on how to most successfully destroy The Void once and for all. During all this, Eli also goes through an unexpected physical alteration that leaves her quite shaken.
Meanwhile, Ky is struggling with being periodically controlled / tortured by The Void while his brother Joshua David, still not quite right in the head after the events of Book 2, has developed the early stages of DID (once referred to as Split Personality Disorder). Honestly, this part of the book was a little hard to keep straight but I BELIEVE "David" was the good side while "Josh" was the evil one?! The chapters in this book, as in the earlier installments, alternate POVs between Eli, Josh and Ky and in Josh's chapters there's a lot of first person referencing "Josh" in third person. For real, compared to the first two books, this one was a massive headache to keep sorted out.
Even the world building! While impressive in the first book, in this one it was more like a literary Christmas lights tangle. Just all over the place. A ton of info dumps.
WAS. NOT. IMPRESSED.
What else went wrong? Well, Eli's sister, Ebony -- While I actually kinda liked her character in the earlier installments, in this conclusion piece I found her distractingly obnoxious. Seriously, WHAT happened to all these characters I loved so much in Book 1??!
Also, AGAIN the reader is assaulted with pop culture references. Goodness, Miss Sara Ella does play to a certain demographic, and HARD. This was an issue I had with the second book and right off the bat in Book 3 I already hit the "hey, young millennial!" wall. Being of the millennial generation myself... for me, being so obvious felt a little desperate to sound relevant... which is generally not really required of a FANTASY novel. But I will say she does ease up on the habit SOME as you move along in this third book. Even so, it's noticeably grating for this reader.
While I found the first book very unique and gripping, having now reached this conclusion novel I find much of the series to be a sort of YA / NA soap opera with mild, not always well plotted out fantasy elements.
Indulge me a momentary rant: *VENICE. SERIOUSLY --- HOW DO YOU DO SOLITTLE WITH SUCH A SETTING??? -- only brief mention of some canals and St. Marks Basilica and then off to anywhere, everywhere else! Why bother working that location in at all, then? At one point, Eli is even going to the literal Land of Oz. No joke.
I read this one in a day but it took ALL DAY with LOTS of breaks in between. Not because of "OMG THE FEELS. SQUUEEE!" but more like I'm so bored outta my gourd I was doing anything and everything -- even laundry and deep cleaning projects, y'all -- procrastinating going back to this book... not a good sign, but since I was sent this one for review, I don't feel right bestowing a DNF on it.
Noted, Sara, you're a fan of OUAT, Disney and all things princess-y and whimsical. You're hip. You're with it. Dukka Dukka Dukka.
One line I will give Sara Ella props for though, is in Chapter 22, when Ky explains how he perceives The Verity: "Pure of heart doesn't mean without darkness... it means a desire for the light." As someone who has had a lot of darkness in her life but still strives for good, I thought this was rather well put.
But yeah, maybe next go 'round, pull back on the pop culture refs just a bit, girl.
FTC Disclaimer: TNZ Fiction Guild kindly provided me with copies of these books in exchange for an honest review. The opinions above are entirely my own.
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