Dark Faerie Tales

Review courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales.

Quick & Dirty: Fast-paced paranormal book filled with great characters, adventure, romance, and an intriguing plot.  This was a great sequel to the first book and I really enjoyed it.

Opening Sentence: When Jie’s letter came in the mail, I was so elated I forgot I had no hand.

The Review:

Eleanor can’t believe how much her life has fallen apart.  Her brother is dead and her mother has gone insane.  Her friends, the Spirit Hunters, fled Philadelphia and headed to Paris to start over.  She is now left with no money, no family, and no friends.  She is determined to stay in Philadelphia until her mother recovers, but the evil Marcus makes a reappearance and Eleanor knows she is going to need help.  She takes the first ship to Paris in hopes of finding help from the Spirit Hunters.

Along her journey she is forced to make some tough decisions to keep herself safe, and she starts to practice the art of necromancy, something she promised herself she would never do.  But tough times call for tough measures.  Upon arriving in Paris she finds a whole new darkness that has to be dealt with, and she’s not sure if she is going to be welcomed by her friends.  She also has to confront the man that rejected her and left her with a broken heart.

Eleanor is the heroine in this story and the book is told from her point of view.  I really like Eleanor and you get to see a very different side of her in this book.  Her dark side makes quite an appearance, which is very different from the first book.  I really liked seeing this side of her, but it did make it a little harder to connect with her at times.  She has a prideful streak in her that is cute and funny.  But she also is a really sweet loyal person and she tries to do the right thing.  I think she is a great character and I can’t wait to see where her story goes from here.

Now for the infuriating, stubborn, adorable Daniel.  I fell in love with Daniel in the first book; his rough personality was endearing and sexy.  He has actually become quite the gentleman now, but when he is around Eleanor you get to see glimpses of the real Daniel.  He is so sweet and so loyal. He is totally swoon worthy.  They have really great chemistry and there is a lot of good tension between them.  I loved their romance, it is well developed and super cute.

I really enjoyed this book.  It is a little darker than the first book, but I really liked where Dennard took the story.  The characters were fleshed out even more and you get to see so many different sides of their personalities.  There is great action and it is fast paced.  It hooked me right at the beginning and I had a hard time putting it down.  I love the setting of the book and the premise is really intriguing. There were some good surprises in the plot that I wasn’t expecting.  As for the ending, it’s not a terrible cliffhanger, but it leaves you wanting to know what happens next.  This was a great sequel to the first book and I can’t wait to see how the story ends. Also, I LOVE the covers of these books, they are so pretty.    I would highly recommend this book to fans of YA Paranormal, it was a really good read.

Notable Scene:

The wind shoved me. I flew forward onto my chest. My face slammed into the gray, splintered dock, and the roaring hounds swallowed everything. I tried to scrabble to my feet, but the moment I lifted my face, the howling stopped.

And I froze.

The dogs were there. Four of them, lips drawn back and fangs bared.

They were huge-bigger than me, bigger than a horse. Hulking, black, and with eyes of sun-bright yellow.

Eyes that were locked on me.

FTC Advisory: Harper Teen provided me with a copy of A Darkness Strange and Lovely. No goody bags, sponsorships, “material connections,” or bribes were exchanged for my review.