Friday, March 16, 2012

Book Review: Everneath


TITLE: Everneath
Book 1 in the Everneath series
AUTHOR: Brodi Ashton
PUBLISHED: 2012
CATEGORY: YA
GENRE: retelling, mythology, romance
PREMISE: A girl returns to Earth for six months after spending time in the Everneath.
MY REVIEW: Here's the thing, I do like Everneath a lot. I think it's a strong debut. I definitely get why it's gotten all this buzz. The writing is nice, the world building is fabulous, I love the twists on Persephone in it, and there's a solid plot going on that makes you want the second book like NOW. I did like it and definitely rec it. However there are two things keeping me from absolutely loving it.
The first is that I'm frankly tired of all the Persephone retellings. This is not the author's fault really, I just wish that when it came to retellings authors would pick other myths. There are several to choose from. I mean counting this series there are now three, THREE, on-going series dealing with the Persephone/Hades myth. Then of course there are all the random one-shot books out there dealing with the myth. I just think at this point in time, the myth has been overdone and it's time to start retelling something different. The second thing that keeps me from loving this is the main character. I'm sorry she's annoying. She's Mary Sueish with a martyr complex and has angst upon angst and don't get me started on how all this basically began with her being all "Oh why would such a perfect man like me of all people?". Ugh, I hate it when girls (and guys with girls) do that. Yes, I give that her reasons for angsting were valid but that still doesn't mean I need her to spend every other chapter doing so. Plus, honestly? She didn't really do much besides the angsting and the self-martyring. Since it was first person I had a bit of a hard time getting into it since I just frankly didn't care for the main character. But from reviews, I'm apparently the only one to get annoyed by her.
But like I said, this is still a strong first book, I do strongly rec it. I just hope the second book develops the main character more and that there's less of the martyring going on.
WHO SHOULD READ: Retelling fans, Persephone and Hades fans
MY RATING: Four out of Five red gowns

2 comments:

  1. The cover is so pretty. I like your review. It gave me another look on the book, because all the other reviews only told me how much they loved the book. Now I really know what I'll find in this book. I still want to read it, because I love mythology.

    & I'm a new follower!

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