Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters who feast on human flesh. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee.
Alina Starkov has never been good at anything. But when her regiment is attacked on the Fold and her best friend is brutally injured, Alina reveals a dormant power that saves his life—a power that could be the key to setting her war-ravaged country free. Wrenched from everything she knows, Alina is whisked away to the royal court to be trained as a member of the Grisha, the magical elite led by the mysterious Darkling.
Yet nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. With darkness looming and an entire kingdom depending on her untamed power, Alina will have to confront the secrets of the Grisha . . . and the secrets of her heart.
All hail Leigh Bardugo. Honestly I adored this book. It has had many mixed reviews, mostly for every four 5 star reviews, there is one 1 star review. This is a 5 star review!This book really reminded me of The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon but a much more accessible version. High fantasy can be really hard to get into and Bardugo makes it look easy.
Alina is a delightful protagonist, she can be a little annoying at first with her weakness and moaning about Mal but once her powers become clear and she becomes determined not to fail or let herself down, she becomes incredibly refreshing. Shadow and Bone takes all the great things from other YA, Dystopian and Fantasy books and mixes them together in a really fantastic, fresh way. It uses Russian Folklore and a huge twist to make itself stand out.
When we first met the Darkling, I admittedly was taken in by his charm, just like Alina. He seemed to really be a good guy if not a little driven and bossy. I never saw the change coming, I was honestly just thinking he was a little dark and mysterious and then it was like BOOM! Bad Guy!
Naturally once he was evil, my attraction faded. Prior to this though I had experienced nothing of Mal besides him ignoring her and sleeping around with girls. So the moment he came for her I was just overcome by gushy-loveyness. The Mal and Alina relationship became incredibly beautiful from that point and there were moments where I had to sit back and just take in such beauty.
Though the book was not only about the love triangle. There was a lovely friendship between Alina and Genya, and I thought her betrayal really helped highlight the hard decisions of a war. You could see her reasoning but also to betray her friend like that was just devastating and I had so many feels.
Overall the storyline was great, the world was so wonderfully built, we were just thrown in and yet everything still felt great and I could tell what was happening. The world was so easy to understand, it was incredibly vibrant and visual and was just so well written. The characters were beiaveble and they all had this great inner self awareness, there were subconcious parts of them which is really hard to achieve through writing and I adored it.
I can't fully explain my newfound passion for this series but I already bought to sequels and pre-ordered Bardugo's new series that comes out in 2015. Maybe that will help show how much I loved this series.
Happy Reading.
Still loves darkling after the trilogys end
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