Alison Pensy

Losing her mother at a young age has left Faedra Bennett with an appreciation for her life with her father, aunt and uncle, her friends and her beloved dog, Faen. But as she approaches her 18th birthday, Faedra starts to question her sanity when she sees glowing eyes watching her, her animals reacting wildly and a recurring burning sensation in her hands.

This is an alright fantasy read. It's not anything new, but it makes a decent showing of all the common tropes. The writing is a bit clunky show more at the start, the scene changes are abrupt and transition strangely. It improved as the plot advanced but returned just in time for the cliffhanger ending, teasing future danger amid romance. Although seemingly aimed at young adults, I would place this on the youngest side of the age bracket. The naivety and wide eyed innocence the characters seemed to have would appeal to a much younger audience. Older readers will likely find this too simplistic to enjoy.

The romance is more of the fairy tale romance than a realistic one. There's a few kisses, holding hands a brief shirtless moment and sleeping in bed together fully clothed. But a few days does not a relationship make. Faen might have known Faedra most of her life but she's always thought of him as a dog. Literally. Because he was her dog. Until she finds he can shapeshift. For all she has spent a lot of time with him, she really doesn't know him in any meaningful way. Also he calls her Ms Faedra. Including the day after she wakes up in bed next to him. There's mention later of their "paradigm" shift to equals because they kissed and he allows her to go with them but it honestly just felt very naive. Especially seeing as he still is her designated Guardian.

The action is rather removed from the main ongoings of Faedra's life. She's attacked a few times but it feels more like a stray thought than real danger. Mostly, she practices her powers, rides her horse, has a birthday party and then gets a chance to visit the fairy realm where there's a ball for the guest of honour accessorised with a glittery ball gown - every preteens perfect fantasy. It's not bad, it's just very wholesome and that can often lose me if I'm not in the right mood.

I liked Faedra's grit but couldn't really warm up to her youth. Faen was too reserved and proper to get to know or to feel a relationship between him and Faedra was believable.

A rather shakily written but heartwarming plot filled with all the fairytale tropes you could want. 2 stars. show less

I don't know what exactly I expected when I purchased this, but it was cheap, the blurb says "backpacking around Australia", and that's two out of three for me (since I don't agree with the cover at all). Definitely don't judge this book by its cover.

While the writing style is just not something that I personally liked, I still think it was good. I'm thinking the author did some good research because I actually learned things from this book and I was genuinely interested in things that show more didn't relate to the romance - the dynamics of an Australian sheep farm, the shearing process, the mustering of the sheep, etc. It was kind of like McLeod's daughters only written down and you get the whole story at once. That's probably a bad comparison, since Sam is actually an English girl, but anyways.

For the most part, I liked Sam. I kind of had a hunch about her past but I wasn't sure until she revealed it all, and yeah, she made sense to me. I liked the way her minds works, too, she's relentless in what she sets out to do and that made her someone I want to relate to.

Daniel was...GAH. So sweet, and kind, and caring, but for the most part...sort of unbelievable. Oh no, not the thing that there is actually a nice guy out there, but he was kind of girlish at times and that I didn't like. Most of the time, though, I absolutely loved him - strong, capable and incredibly sexy as far as book boyfriends go. And patient! I really liked how subtle he was about getting Sam to trust him and yeah. Swoon.

The two of them were just too damn cute. I couldn't get over it, they have great chemistry, great interactions, but I have to say, as far as romances these days go - everything was very low-key for the better part of the book.

Now, I'll start off by saying that there were some laugh out loud moments in this book. There weren't many permanent characters (is this a thing?), but even the ones we briefly meet along the way were great and I connected with them - like Becca who literally gets just a few lines, the old lady in the beginning or Sophie and Jensen and Moose. The author creates believable conflict and doesn't resort to some petty dramas, which I liked a lot. Actually, what I liked the most about this is that there really wasn't some major drama. The way it all ties up in the end, I needed that in romance.

What didn't I like about it? The whole story is told in 3rd person limited from Sam's POV, except the author does a bit of head hopping at least twice which caught me completely off guard and confused me. And the ending felt rushed. I was in the last 7-8 percent of the story and nothing seemed to be happening to actually indicate that the ending was near and then it ended. It may be just me, but I wanted more.

For those wondering, there are graphic sex scenes in this. Actually, as far as I remember there was only one...or two. And they're not even that graphic.

Do I recommend it? Yeah, it's got everything: romance, some very interesting information about something you never thought you wanted to know about, a couple of LOL moments, a story about traveling and it's Oz...I definitely recommend it. It was a sweet story. show less

There were parts of this books that were just a shade on the too graphic side for me, especially considering this is "young adult" fiction. So if you 11-14 year old picks it up you might want to give it a read yourself first. That's said it is a good read and while they won't be high on my list of must read books the rest of the series will be there.