Bijou has always known she was different, with abilities and insights no-one else shared. Her nights were disturbed by weird and surreal dreams. Many times she thought she was losing her mind and she did her best to develop ways to cope with the impressions and senses that bombarded her

Her eccentric and dramatic grandmother seemed determined to shelter her and keep her from the world, but Bijou wishes a normal life and after a long battle, succeeds in being enrolled in school for the first time.

While it’s overwhelming, it’s not school that derails Bijou’s life – but the revelations of the people in it. As she increasingly sees the Others and her dreams become more vivid, more strange and clearer, her own nature is becoming known to those around her – and the secrets of her past, her family and her very nature are finally being revealed.

This book began with a slow, but intriguing start. We had a lot of foreshadowing, a lot of build up for this huge and powerful world and a slow gradual indication that Bijou was something well and truly special. It wasn’t a great start – it did drag, but the world setting seemed fascinatingly broad with a new slant – especially since we had an emphasis on Djinns rather than the usual stalwarts of western mythology.

Except then we hit the half way mark and the story knotted itself up, “djinn” was just used as “generic supernatural” in the same way other authors have used “fae” and then there were the characters.

The characters derailed this book for me. Or rather, character – because while there are a lot of other cast members we never really see them be developed, we know some things they’ve done, but no real sense of who they are as people. I think Bijou was the only realised character in this large cast.

And I didn’t like her.

She is, like so many Urban Fantasy protagonists, very very very angst laden. Part of this is from her powers which, like so many many many Urban Fantasy protagonists, she doesn’t like and just wants to be normal. Already my angst fatigue cries, but I can filter the angst into background noise if it is well done, well reasoned and she has some other, redeeming qualities.

Which is where we hit the problem. One of Bijou’s perennial complaints is that she’s lonely and isolated – one of the reasons she wants to go to school is to develop a social life and social skills. I’m wondering if the author is taking that into account in her depiction – because Bijou has no social skills at all. This adds to her loneliness because she make no effort to make friends at all! Seriously, she arrives, she has over half a dozen people trying so very hard to be her friend (alright there are 2 Mean Girls, but every high school setting HAS to have mean girls who hate her because she has attracted the interest of her man and is just too beautiful! It’s a rule, how else are we to know how beautiful she is without the adoration of men and the jealousy of women? Ugh) but she makes no effort at all, she zones out constantly when they talk to her and spends the entire time mooning after the hot guy Sebastian on the next table. Even then, there are at least 3 people who tolerate her enough to continue playing friends – she’s not nearly as friendless as she paints herself.

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I’m happily surprised that I actually enjoyed this book!

I had my speculations that it was gunna be boring and drab and just like everything else (I was kinda, for some reason, getting a Mortal Instruments vibe there for a while), and then it picked up speed and got hella interesting. Some things were over the top and kinda outrageous, but I love how it came together.

There is so much to Concealed and I loved exploring Bijou and the new revelations in her life. Her name is freaking awesome!

It was great to see the mythology in this (Puck!). It seemed that there was a ton of surprises that creeped around every corner. Some things I definitely didn’t see coming and some things I did.

Sebastian is oh so good. He reminded me of Howl from Howl’s Moving Castle for some reason. :) And Nikolai is adorable.

Amina is a great accomplice and she actually didn’t get on my nerves as much as I thought she would.

Concealed is a good read if you’re looking something full of awesome. ( )

This is a very hard book to rate, I would have to place it somewhere between 3 1/2 and 4 stars.

Kromah's debut book is a very colorful and detailed novel that is unlike anything popping up on the young adult shelves today.

Bijou Fitzroy is odd, not only because she lacks social skills due to years of homeschooling and constant moving, but her appearances are also very off putting. When she meets Sebastian and his twin sister Amina, she realizes that there just may be a reason why her looks attract so much attention, a reason that her grandmother hid from her for years.

When Bijou moves to Eldersburg the questions start to come up. Why can she sense 'the others?' Who is this Austrailian kid that she can't stop thinking about? And what on Earth is her grandmother hiding from her? Kromah deals with these questions and their reveal very strategically. She gives just enough information to hint that an answer is near, but with the answer she creates a new and even bigger question that the reader is dying to find the answer to. Even with so many questions and answers popping up, the plot moves at a steady pace throughout with a slew of interesting characters to guide you on this journey.

One thing I really liked was the diversity among the characters and among the mythos. In YA the standard is white people having weird things happen to them in a white town, with white secondary characters. Luckily, Kromah decides to spice it up a bit by having a main character who doesn't even know what her nationality is. We are then introduced to a bunch of other secondary characters who each have a mind for themselves with motives that the reader would not guess until the very last chapter. Like I stated earlier these characters have a motive, there is a reason why they are doing what they are doing, and it just isn't because someone told them to follow orders which is very refreshing.

The love story was not very prominent but it was hinted at heavily, and there were even hints of introducing a love triangle which I am a bit weary about ( you know how I feel about the dreaded love triangle). Regardless of the love story, both the main characters, Sebastian and Bijou, have very distinct personalities and are very solid characters. They do not depend on each other and they are very capable of making their own decisions.

Lastly, the writing style was told from the first person perspective so the reader was just as confused by the events of the book as Bijou was. One thing I did notice about the writing style is that the author had a tendency to overuse the exclamation mark. Although it does not sound like something worth noting, there were many times where I had to reread a phrase because the excited tone that I was giving the characters did not seem appropriate. Other than that, the writing style was very solid and allowed the reader to really delve inside Bijou's curious and interesting head.

The reason why I am stuck in no man's land with this rating is because there were a few small things that when repeated, kind of got to me. For example, there were a few typos and grammatical errors all throughout the novel, and an occurring mistranslation. And given the amount of information and characters introduced into this single novel, I really believe that it could have been broken up into different books because there were so many characters and relationships between said characters that I almost felt the need to draw myself a map.

Overall, Kromah's novel is extremely original and well-crafted. She introduces us to a very interesting world filled with mythologies that and secrecy that will have you waiting for the second book!

I recommend this novel for those who loved the old mythos are and looking for something new. ( )