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chronicallybrenna 's review for:
Secrets of Isoria
by Cristina Macari
First I would like to thank the author for sending me a copy to review.
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I rated this book 3 stars. When reading my review take into account that I am 19 and I feel that the ideal audience for this book is kids 12-16. I think the premise of this book is fantastic- the secret hidden world full of sorcerers, the spy ring, the secrets the betrayal, her discovering it at 16 and having lots of power. But I think that too much stuff happened in this book. This book was so full of action and things were constantly happening that it was sometimes hard to keep up with and I wish things were more fleshed out and descriptive. Things just happened to fast I couldn’t keep up and there was no feeling of suspense. Orion was just thrust into a world of magic with lies and deceit everywhere and I wish those suspenseful moments would have been more played out. I wish more time was spent on the school and the spy aspect and also for Orion to actually learn and control her powers. Like I said too much happens and there wasn’t enough time to give everything the detail it deserved. I liked the main character and The side characters such as Banden and Julian but we barely know anything about them. There is never time in this book for Orion to also be with people and discover them- instead she’s just going from one action scene to another. The climax of this book fell flat for me because I just didn’t get enough time with the characters to connect with them or be surprised by the twist. I need to know more about Orion’s relationship with her mom, more about Banden, more about the friends and just everyone in general.
I know that paragraph seemed negative but I promise you this book has a super good premise and that is what kept me reading. I loved the magic and the idea behind Isoria in general. I think having 16 year old Orion discovering this world that has been hidden from her for her whole life was a great way to start this book. This way we get to discover things as Orion does. I like how Orion was especially gifted in air magic as I haven’t seen much of that in other books featuring elemental magic. I think the idea of Alec is fantastic and a great counter to Orion- I just wish we got to see more interaction with them at the beginning of the book and more actual scenes of them together.
For a debut book I think it’s a really good start to a series that has the potential to be great. I hope book 2 brings more insight to the world and relationships between characters and also grows on this idea of the Obsidian King as in this book he felt like more of a distant villain.
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I rated this book 3 stars. When reading my review take into account that I am 19 and I feel that the ideal audience for this book is kids 12-16. I think the premise of this book is fantastic- the secret hidden world full of sorcerers, the spy ring, the secrets the betrayal, her discovering it at 16 and having lots of power. But I think that too much stuff happened in this book. This book was so full of action and things were constantly happening that it was sometimes hard to keep up with and I wish things were more fleshed out and descriptive. Things just happened to fast I couldn’t keep up and there was no feeling of suspense. Orion was just thrust into a world of magic with lies and deceit everywhere and I wish those suspenseful moments would have been more played out. I wish more time was spent on the school and the spy aspect and also for Orion to actually learn and control her powers. Like I said too much happens and there wasn’t enough time to give everything the detail it deserved. I liked the main character and The side characters such as Banden and Julian but we barely know anything about them. There is never time in this book for Orion to also be with people and discover them- instead she’s just going from one action scene to another. The climax of this book fell flat for me because I just didn’t get enough time with the characters to connect with them or be surprised by the twist. I need to know more about Orion’s relationship with her mom, more about Banden, more about the friends and just everyone in general.
I know that paragraph seemed negative but I promise you this book has a super good premise and that is what kept me reading. I loved the magic and the idea behind Isoria in general. I think having 16 year old Orion discovering this world that has been hidden from her for her whole life was a great way to start this book. This way we get to discover things as Orion does. I like how Orion was especially gifted in air magic as I haven’t seen much of that in other books featuring elemental magic. I think the idea of Alec is fantastic and a great counter to Orion- I just wish we got to see more interaction with them at the beginning of the book and more actual scenes of them together.
For a debut book I think it’s a really good start to a series that has the potential to be great. I hope book 2 brings more insight to the world and relationships between characters and also grows on this idea of the Obsidian King as in this book he felt like more of a distant villain.