Friday Reads: ARC Review of The Great Hunt by Wendy Higgins!!!

Do you know that feeling of reading a book quite well in advance of release date and then when you next think about it, release day is almost there now and you need to write a review??

Well, that's exactly what happened to me with the book I'm featuring on this week's Friday Reads! I was beyond lucky to get an ARC of this one back in October and read it right away, and now March 8th is nearly here and a review must be written! (And writing it is making me itch to re-read it, cannot wait for my finished copy!).



The Great Hunt by Wendy Higgins

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I adore Wendy Higgins since I first read Sweet Evil, quite a while ago, before it was even picked up to be the trilogy we all know and love, and when she announced that her new book would be a fantasy duology I was super excited and not even the fact that it was a fairy tale retelling (yep, I'm not overly fond of those) made me doubt that I'd love it! And as always Wendy didn't disappoint!

The Great Hunt is a retelling of The Singing Bone, one of the Grimm Brother's tale that I haven't read before (I'm quite curious to read it now) and so I cannot say how much it was changed or taken from it, but I absolutely loved how Wendy wove the story with a certain fairy tale feeling but gave it her own flair!

There is so much tension on this book! First of all with the monster murdering people and no one feeling safe, then with the hunt going on, the civil unrest and the romance development... I had to take a breather while reading now and then because it really got intense at times!

I really liked how Princess Aerity was loved and happy with her family and how she found herself in a less than ideal position and although she was unhappy and angry she also felt that she had to do her duty to her kingdom & help however she could, even if it meant sacrificing her own future happiness. I really loved her less formal side and her silk aerial abilities!

Paxton is a bit of a play on the broody and distant boy and not entirely your usual fairy tale hero, and I loved that he had his secrets but that risked everything to help rid his people of the monster's danger. I loved how ready he was to work with other hunters to try and kill the monster and was not all about the glory.

We do get more than a few surprises and twists along the book, and that combined with all the tension building up during the book makes for an absolute page turner that ends in quite an awful cliffhanger (of the emotional kind, just not a death) that leaves you pinning for the next book and for me the wait is even worse because lucky me I read this book in October 2015 and the next book doesn't bloody well come out till 2017!! *wails & whimpers in despair*

Very much deserved 5 stars to this one. Highly recommended if you love retellings and if you don't? Give this one a try, it'll surprise you for sure!







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Thursday Thoughts: The Shadow Queen by C.J. Redwine!!!

Hey there guys!

Given my failure this week at blogging so far, I needed to add another extra Thursday Thoughts to the so far empty week!

I had a fairly good reason for the radio silence since I've been reading multiple books at once (not that it is new) but most have been re-reads or readalongs and also, FINALLY my living room furniture arrive!!

And because I'm crazy excited about them, I'm just gonna share a pic of them just as they had been finally assembled, will have to share pics of them filling up with stuff next time!

Now, onto today's review!! I think those of you who know me a bit are aware that I love fantasy books, but at the same time I'm not usually a fan of retellings, but one of my auto-buy authors go and write one, I have to check it and thankfully, trusting the author pays off!!



The Shadow Queen by C.J. Redwine

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


First things first, I'm not the biggest fan of retelling stories there is, and when I see a book is a retelling of something else I'm usually a little wary of it. BUT C.J. Redwine became an auto-buy author since the very first book of her Defiance trilogy, so when she announced this one, a retelling of Snow White, I knew I'd read it!

And I'm really quite happy that I kept my trust on the author, because The Shadow Queen was a fantastic retelling! It mixed the fairy tale feel & also made it more regular fantasy-like if that makes sense! The prologue was very much done in a more typical fairy tale story format & style, but then when we move forward in time to meet Lorelai again, the narrative is less typical and much more engaging!

We have two main POV characters, Kol and Lorelai, but Lorelai IS our main character, our Snow White! I feel like the story is a bit inspired by both the classical story and the Snow White & the Huntsman movie, at least given that our Snow White is a fighter and not like the Disney version! ;) And no, there are no dwarves in this one, we get something way cooler, since we get DRAGONS!!

Lorelai has magic and is determined to defeat the evil queen, Irina, and is simply an amazing main character! Driven, brave, capable and compassionate. She's an absolute warrior and ready to do the right thing at any personal cost but not at the cost of those around her. I simply adored having a princess that didn't need rescuing, although she welcomed allies of course! She dealt with grief but didn't let it paralize her turn her cold, didn't let a pretty boy make her loose the view of what's the most important and has been for the past 9 years, but still allows herself to be open to connections and to love!

Kol is the other POV character and he is so much more than a prince that kisses our girl to wake her up, although weeeell, nope, not saying anything else. Kol is a reluctant prince that finds himself in a position that he never thought he'd be in and never wanted, but that raises to the occasion and that like Lorelai, is fighting to do what's right for others more than for himself.

The relationship between those two was quite fantastic, and slowly developed from "casual meeting where the girl save his life and his friends" to "I'm going to kill you but I don't want to" to allies and much more!

I must also talk about the Evil Queen in this story... Irina is evil but not because of her magic but for her own twisted reasons that you sort of can understand. You really don't because she's just blinded about her sense of entitlement and what she thinks she's been robbed of, but it's not random evil, it's rooted on a sense of loss and it twists her to forgo love for power. A very intriguing character and a well developed villain!

All in all, I really loved this one! It's very much its own story although you can see the nods here and there to the original story and the roots of it. I cannot wait to read the next book in this series and see what fairy tale will be retold, C.J. Redwine style! Well deserved 5 stars!!

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Waiting On Wednesday #74!!

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted at Breaking The Spine  that spotlights those can't-wait-to-get-my-hands-on-them books that we are eagerly awaiting!

So, what book is the one I'm bitting my nails waiting for it this week? Fairest by Marissa Meyer!!

Goodreads Summary:

"In this stunning bridge book between Cress and Winter in the bestselling Lunar Chronicles, Queen Levana’s story is finally told.

Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of them all?

Fans of the Lunar Chronicles know Queen Levana as a ruler who uses her “glamour” to gain power. But long before she crossed paths with Cinder, Scarlet, and Cress, Levana lived a very different story – a story that has never been told . . . until now.

Marissa Meyer spins yet another unforgettable tale about love and war, deceit and death. This extraordinary book includes full-color art and an excerpt from Winter, the next book in the Lunar Chronicles series."


Why am I eagerly awaiting Fairest? Well, I'm a BIG fan of the Lunar Chronicles series, and even if I'm dying even more for the final book of the series, I cannot wait to get my preorder of this one, a prequel that tells the story of Queen Levana, and books about villains are always quite interesting!!

What are you all (im)patiently awaiting this week?