Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Title: Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Author: Laini Taylor
Publisher: Little, Brown & Company
Pages: 420

Summary:

Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil’s supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she’s prone to disappearing on mysterious “errands”; she speaks many languages–not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she’s about to find out.

When one of the strangers–beautiful, haunted Akiva–fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

This was my first Laini Taylor novel. And let me tell you, I was so excited to get an ARC of this book I did a little dance the day it arrived. Lots of my good friends have read her other works and even this one, and raved about it. Which is why I feel like maybe something is wrong with me for not loving it as much as I hoped I would…

There isn’t, right?

Maybe this just wasn’t my thing. Don’t get me wrong, Taylor has a gorgeous way with words and an astonishing imagination. This book isn’t like anything I’ve read before. And then some. Laini managed to keep me guessing from beginning to end, and that was what kept me turning pages one after the next. I’m one of those omg-I-must-know-wtf-is-going-
on-right-now kind of people and this is one of those kinds of books where you’re constantly on your toes looking to solve the next little mystery inside its words.

It was never boring, but at times, it did feel overdone. Like there was just too much at once going on. The first three hundred pages built up this big finish and then the final piece of the novel was where everything started to come out pow-pow-pow and then bam it was over. Sorry Caren, you have to wait until the next book for more!

Just so we’re clear, I really hate that. As time goes on it seems to happen more and more, and it’s becoming more than frustrating.

But that’s a rant for another day…

In short I’ll say this: The story was beautiful. I loved Karou (she was a total badass). I wanted to hug Akiva and put him in my pocket. I wanted to take Brimstone out for a beer and loosen him up a little. Hell, I even liked Izil a little bit, poor guy.

But, now that I’ve finished and I know the whole story – it seems to me the heart of this book was about love, and I just…didn’t feel it. I want all-encompassing overpowering mad love, and in this case, it was overshadowed by too many other details for me to care about it like I should have.

and

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