Daughter of Smoke & Bone

It's difficult for me to understand how a book could have such deep, creative and compelling world-building and such shallow and cliche romance.

The good: The world Taylor built is really lush. The politics in the war between the angels and chimera are nuanced and interesting, and more than that, you get a feeling that there's a depth of culture to both sides much more than what you even read.

The start of this book is one of the best I've ever read – I loved the descriptions of Prague and the rapport between Karou and Zuze. I found Brimstone and Issa and the rest a compelling mystery, and I felt myself quickly caught up in the mystery of who Karou was and what the teeth were for.

For all that there are hundreds of books about the morals for and against magic, I thought that this was the first that really made doing magic feel weighty, but not objectively bad and I loved that. I liked the metaphysics of magic in general.

I love books that explore the tension between “real life” and the supernatural and for at least the first half of the book there was still classes and grades and friends that Karou was trying to balance with saving the world.

The medium: Karou is the Mary Sue to end all Mary Sues. She's slender (as we're told at least seventeen times) and The Best Draw-er and Everyone Loves Her Ideas and she has
“naturally” blue hair and never gets scared and is good at everything. But...I kind of liked her anyway. She's strong and self-contained and has a ton of agency, even once she meets up with the male romantic lead.

The ugly: Ugh, the romance. I'm not a romantic; I don't read romance and I certainly don't do paranormal romance, so clearly not the intended audience. But he's handsome and perfect and they're instantly in love and ugh, ugh, ugh. And even though they're star-crossed lovers from a past life, they were instantly in love then, too. So.... And when they're together all of the descriptions are bland and shallow and cliche.

Supposedly the sequels are more world-building, less romance. I'll check them out...

This book had a lot of steep highs and lows for me. From the beginning though I was convinced it was going to be all highs. There is an atmosphere, an energy to Laini Taylor's writing that doesn't just draw you in, it makes you want to be there. It's exceptionally rich and evocative. I like that she writes about arty kids, in all their effervescence and quirk as well as pretentiousness and tendency for appropriation (yes, I'm looking at you Mik, take off the fucking eyepatch). It might annoy some people I'm sure, but for me it reminds me of the friends I used to have and all their flighty ambitions. Taylor created an environment for the main character that felt so nostalgic yet new, shiny but still mysterious.

She also writes romance in one of the few ways I can handle it, though only just barely - completely and utterly over-the-top. Here love is not so much a story of partnership and personality, but treated almost consistently in the abstract, and its fairly upfront about that. We don't really know anything about why Karou and Akiva love eachother, other than destiny or some shit like that, but that's not really the point. Their story, their romance was, in its origin, a rebellion, an act that they hoped would sew the seeds of change. That isn't always something that works for me, but when you meet sex with defiance (and yes, people have sex in this book, huzzah!) well then I'm all ears.

But that can make getting pulled into the characters a little difficult. I didn't care about Akiva at all. It didn't matter how torrid his backstory was, or how metatextually beautiful he was, he came off whiny and brooding pretty much like every other YA love interest. At least he wasn't possessive, so that's a plus, but he did try to kill her.

When it started going into the flashbacks my interest kind of crashed. Learning about the chimaera, particularly Brimstone and his work, brought it back for a little while and then we went into the rather predictable tragic love story. A very sweet, captivating tragic love story, but still utterly cliche. I suppose its a good sign that I like Karou more than Madrigal, as she is the "older" version of her. She's more aggressive, not as afraid to be flashy and enjoy her own beauty. It's refreshing to have a heroine like that, whereas Madrigal felt like a Mary Sue with horns and wings, which is pretty Mary Sueish anyway.

And then that's pretty much it. I was a bit startled to realize that Daughter of Smoke and Bone kind of doesn't stand on its own in terms of story arc. It serves as a kind of prologue - here's your characters, here's why they're important, we'll get to actual things happening a bit later. I don't know how I feel about where the series will go my favorite aspect was Brimstone, and he's dead , but if there's some Thiago getting his furry fucking behind whipped then I will undoubtedly be compelled to continue.

The more I think about it the more I've grieving for how good the first part of this book was. The imagery alone is almost overwhelming - Karou's chimaera family, the burning doors, Akiva crashing down into the streets of Marrakesh. Even the fight scenes were pretty well done. I know the movie rights have been picked up, and I've got my fingers crossed for Guillermo del Toro to get his hands on it.

Abstracts are cool, even when it turns a character into more of a symbol. Romance with a big sweeping capital R is fun. For a little bit. And to be perfectly honest, I really kind of like purple prose, its like a comfortable blanket to me. Unfortunately, it all wasn't able to hold together all the way through, but the good stuff is definitely there. And it's certainly better than a lot of other stuff out there.

4.5 Stars
Initial Thoughts: This book was amazingly well written and had great characters. I really appreciated how this story progressed and how we came to know more about Karou and Akiva. I appreciated the changing POVs since it really helped bring the two characters' stories together. This book ended with a huge cliffhanger so I'm glad I have the next book to immediately start reading to see what happens next to Karou and Akiva. There is still a lot to find out about the Chimaera and Angels. I'm really looking forward to diving further into this world and read more of Laini Taylor's amazing writing. I love her writing style and love how descriptive and imaginative she is.

4.25/5 stars

Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love. It did not end well.

Things I Will Probably Never Do In My Life
bc hi, my name is Emi and I'm scared of everything, especially commitment

Things This Book Makes Me Wanna Do
but probably won't bc hi, my name is Emi and I'm scared of everything, especially commitment

as technically they are already in love with each other but KAROU HAS NO MEMORY OF HER LIFE AS MADRIGAADSAL AND ANGEL DUDE DOESN'T KNOW IT'S HER

Karou.

Example A:

Example B:

Example C:

Example D:

Example E:

Akiva.

okay

Zuzna.

Kaz.

Conclusion? Conclusion??? Conclusion.

What a fantastic read! This book exceeded every single expectation I had for it. It was nice to have a book like this with something other than vampires and werewolves. This was a beautiful story with awesome characters. I had a hard time putting it down. I hope the second book is as great as this one.

Set in the hauntingly, magical city of Prague Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor is about Karou, a peculiar girl with blue hair she claims to grow naturally out of her head, with tattoos of eyes on her palms that she has had long before she can remember, and sketchbooks filled with beasts of all kinds that are as beautiful as they are frightening, beasts that all of Karou's friends think come straight from her imagination but are as real as the wish beads Karou wears around her neck. Daughter of Smoke and Bone is about an art student, who has no idea where she came from, whose earliest memory is Brimstone, a chimera whose mysterious work involves the collection of teeth and the creation of wishes. Whose workshop can be accessed through doors positioned all over the world and whose shop doesn't seem to be in the real world at all but Elsewhere.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone is about a threat to Karou's way of life that may finally reveal who Karou truly is, but at a price that may take away everything she loves.

Through her rich and sensory writing style Laini Taylor really succeeded in taking a concept that, in my opinion, was overdone to the point of being mundane and turning it into a distinctive and noteworthy story. Her talent for description and world building was what won me over in Daughter of Smoke and Bone, a story that could have been ordinary if written by the wrong person but ended up being wonderful.

This was such a beautiful book, a book that, in my opinion, really sets the bar for paranormal YA. All of you who think you love your books about angels and forbidden romance or those like me who have been disappointed with all the angel books you've come across pick up Daughter of Smoke and Bone because it will be such a delightful surprise and have you wishing that you had found it sooner.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone is a novel that deserves to be read slowly to appreciate the detail and effort put into it, but if you find yourself whipping through it I won't blame you.

Wow.... Just wow. I haven't been this touched by a book in years. Laini Taylor has crafted so much beauty, emotion and depth in a seemingly effortless art. I'm struggling to find the words to describe or explain how I'm feeling after finishing this novel but the tears, the jaw-aching grin and overwhelming sensation of happiness will have to be enough. Thank you, Laini, for this gem that I will always treasure. And welcome to my “favourite authors” list!

OOOOKAY, I was not expecting this.

I feel like I've wanted to read this book since forever. I always kept saying that I was going to read it and when I finally decided to order it, my order got lost on the way somehow. A couple of months after that, I decided to give it another go. And here I am, finishing the first book. And I really loved it!

This book started out really good, but then it got a bit too slow for my liking and I was starting to feel bored, but then things started picking up again and then it turned into an emotional rollercoaster. I really enjoyed the story and the characters, even though I don't feel like I know them that well, but there are 2 more books left so I'm not going to complain about that.

This is an absolutely beautiful book. It's no secret I read a fair amount of YA, and while I try to stay away from the really crappy ones, sometimes I read some that are pretty fluffy. This is NOT one of those books. Daughter of Smoke and Bone is full of lyrical prose, fully fleshed out and intelligent characters and a blow-you-away world of beauty and mysticism. It depicts a Prague that feels real and timeworn (especially in comparison to The Book of Blood and Shadow, 2 stars) and the other world Taylor has created with dueling species and unique mythology is possibly the best YA fantasy world I've yet seen. And don't even get me started on the love story. Yes, this book has the obligatory angsty romance but there is NOTHING eye roll inducing to be found between these pages and I'm not ashamed to say that I caught myself swooning multiple times. Hands down this is a winner, and I highly recommend it to anyone who wishes to lose themselves completely to the awe of a lovely and magical book.

Laini Taylor has created a beautifully written and extremely original book in Daughter of Smoke and Bone. I was hooked from the first page by her gorgeous, prose-like writing. It was never cloying or overdone. Her characters were fantastic. Karou, Brimstone, Issa, Akiva, Zuze, Mik – I couldn't help but fall in love with them. As histories and true identities were revealed, the character interactions gained an even greater depth.

Akiva & Madrigal? Swoon. Their dream? Maybe a little far-reaching, but beautiful all the same. What happened to both of them? Heartbreaking.

The last few chapters were somewhat painful to read, but in the best possible way. The tension between Karou and Akiva and the uncertainty of their futures made for a great cliffhanger ending.

I absolutely loved this book and would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone I know. Miss Taylor, thank you for giving something so unique and lovely to us bookworms! (And thanks to my coworker for recommending it!)

The Good:
Angels vs. Chimaera. Much more than one-dimensional good vs. evil.
Great range of characters and relationships.
Humor, anguish, love, hatred, malice, mystery, and HOPE.

The Bad:
nothing, as far as I'm concerned

For my full review on this book and others, please visit: electricyawp.wordpress.com