Hello everyone and welcome to a special edition of
Friday Reads! I'm very happy to be part of the Blog Tour for
ParaWars: Uprising by
Caitlin Greer!
ParaWars: Uprising is Caitlin's NA take on the Urban Fantasy/Paranormal genre that came out on October 15th. I'm quite a fan of UF/Paranormal and when I read the blurb and heard that there were gargoyles here, I knew I wanted to read this one and when I got the chance to be part of the tour I jumped at it!
The Paranormal Uprising brought myth and legend out of the shadows
and into real life. The war that followed tore the world apart. Two
years after the Uprising, twenty-year-old Kendry is learning the hard
way that the battle lines aren’t as clear-cut as human versus para. And
the hard way means being hunted down by both human militants and para
separatists. Trouble is, she has no idea why.
On the run
with only her mysterious gargoyle guardian, Kendry knows that finding
out why she’s on everyone’s most-wanted list will be no easy task. It
means charging headlong into a war she’d hoped to avoid, and is woefully
unprepared for. So when she realizes that everyone in her life has been
lying to her, discovering that she’s somehow the key to ending the war
is the last thing she needs. With both sides tearing up the world to
find her, it’s decision time for Kendry—keep running, or stand up and
fight.
Author Bio:
Cait writes YA and NA stories that range from
sci-fi and fantasy (because she loves making worlds and things up), to
contemporary (because she kind of sort of fell into it and discovered
she’s not half bad). Her best friends growing up were the combined works
of Robin McKinley, Madeline L'Engle, Anne McCaffrey, Andre Norton, and
too many others to mention.
She drives a Jeep, loves the
outdoors, takes pictures of everything she can, and writes obsessively. A
martial artist and a former teacher, Cait is owned by two cats who
started out incredibly small, and are now incredibly huge.
She currently live in Utah, but Virginia will always be home.
Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7020757.Cait_Greer
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Cait_Greer
ParaWars: Uprising Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18283667-parawars
My Review:
I was lucky enough to receive an eARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
Just
by the name of the book you'll probably be guessing that ParaWars:
Uprising is part of the urban fantasy/paranormal genre, and you'd be
right. I have read quite a bit of UF/paranormal books and although I
can't claim to be an expert, I can tell you that ParaWars is a fresh
take on the genre.
You would also be wondering what paranormal
creatures are the ones we can find in here? Well, all! All? Yep, think
of any paranormal creature and it's quite likely that it'll be here!
From Gods from any and all mythologies, to minotaurs, to your usual
weres, ghosts to even the Jabberwocky (or maybe a Jaberwocky?).
The
ParaWars were world-wide wars that started when the paranormals all
over the world decided to reveal their existence to humankind and when
the humans didn't take that very well and decided that they didn't want
to share their world with the paras, even if they had been living
together for centuries (unknowingly).
Two years after the start
of the Uprising of the ParaWars Kendry, our main character, lives in a
small town where paras and humans have found a way to coexist
peacefully, hoping that the raging war will not come to their doors. But
their luck doesn't hold and an army of human soldiers comes and takes
most of the population, paras and humans alike, prisoners. Kendry
escapes capture at first cause she had been out running, but in her
trying to rescue her mum she's captured again. But Axel, her friend and a
gargoyle, does rescue her and a few other prisoners, but the majority of
them including Kendry's mum are moved away somewhere else. Kendry wants
to try and rescue her mom and after a bit of a debate with some of the
humans and paras a rescue party is formed. It's clear from here that
there are quite a few things that Kendry doesn't know about what's going
on and possibly about herself.
On the beginning ParaWars showed a
lot of potential with giving us a fresh perspective on the UF world but
also seemed to be close to falling in some of the topics of the genre,
but luckily the author managed to avoid the possible pitfalls and we
have plenty of interesting characters, a lot of secrets and revelations,
a steamy romance that starts as a friendship with a spark (a big one)
but with no sign of insta-love.
Kendry is a 20 year old that has
given up on the usual dreams since the ParaWars have wrecked how life
used to be, but she tries to make the best of her situation, she's
headstrong and brave and a bit reckless on occasion. She's got some
spunk and she can hold her own since both her mum and dad taught her how
to survive in the wild.
Axel is a gargoyle, and that in itself
was part of the reason why I wanted to read this book, none of the books
in UF I've read so far have had gargoyles! He befriends Kendry and once
all the shit starts to hit the fan, he's there trying to protect her
and help her as much as he can, which when it comes to revealing
information is not enough for Kendry's taste.
The dinamics
between these two are fun, even if the hot and cold can border a bit on
the "oh kiss already dammit!!" but well, the wait is quite worth it, what a first kiss those two share!
There's plenty of
action, some characters you'll fall in love, some unexpected
revelations, some despicable villains and plenty of character growth for
Kendry.
I'm also very happy to report that the book doesn't end
with a cliffhanger, the story is wrapped up but we are left with an opening
for the next book and the realization that the game is deeper than we
thought!
Great new addition to the UF/Paranormal genre and very well deserved 4 stars!
