Sandy

Ever since she was a little girl there has been a prophecy about Blue Sargent, if she kisses her true love he will die, and this prophecy has been around for so much of her life that Blue has grown quite used to it, at times believing it and at other times thinking it's a trick from her clairvoyant mother to keep Blue from kissing any boys. Then one night on St. Mark's Eve in a church yard Blue sees a spirit of a boy who will die within the year. But Blue isn't a seer and the only explanations for her seeing a soon-to-be-spirit is: one, he is Blue's true love or two, she is the one that will kill him. Blue has never met the boy however and all she knows about him is that he is a student from Aglionby, a Raven Boy, and that his name is Gansey.

Gansey is a boy on a quest, sort of like Indiana Jones but with less bad guys to beat up and tombs to raid, though, he is looking for a tomb. For many years Gansey has been searching for Glendower, an old Welsh king, why? I'd tell you but then that would spoil you. Aiding Gansey in his quest are his three closest friends Noah, a shy boy who barely speaks and does less of everything else, Ronan an angry boy with a broken past who seems to want to destroy his future, and Adam who tries his best in school and has multiple jobs so that he can truly be free and never have to depend on or belong to anyone.

The Raven Boys is a story filled with ley lines, magic, and old Welsh mythology and it is a story about friendship, complex characters and their complex relationships. And although The Raven Boys focuses very much on the plot of Gansey's quest, the story also equally focuses on the lives of the characters, not only their back stories but their goals and motivations, their personal lives and their starkly different personalities that seem to mesh perfectly even though logic says they shouldn't.

When it comes to her writing Maggie Stiefvater has a very subtle style where she will say a lot but with very little words making almost every word you read vital. I like this because it kept me focus on what I was reading and kept my mind whirring as I worked out what a character was doing or not doing. I also had to be careful though because when I got caught up in a scene I would need to slow down, re-read it and make sure I understood what just took place, which I didn't mind because I loved reading this book.

In my opinion this is Maggie's best novel yet, not only is her writing wonderful but the story is unique and the characters intriguing. I've heard there will be four books total in The Raven Cycle series and I know it's going to be torture waiting for each one of them.

3.5 but rounded up to 4. I am happy with where the story left the main characters. The villain in the final novel wasn't all that interesting to me. He was an entity and not a person so he felt one dimensional and I didn't find his POV interesting at all. However I loved Lilah, Kell, Rhy and Holland so they made up for those chapters.

Maybe it's because I was never a fan of things that seemed too dark or heavy or maybe it's because the majority of my reading leans towards the paranormal and fantasy but I've never read a book on this subject matter. Was I nervous going in? Yes, I was weary, maybe I was getting into something that would be too heavy for me to handle that maybe I'll think it's good but I won't be rereading it any time soon if ever. Thankfully I was wrong. The Tension of Opposites was a great book because I think the way Kristina McBride handled this subject was perfect. Read more