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Sunday, October 28, 2012

BBReview: "The Otherworld Trilogy 1: Faelorehn" By Jenna Elizabeth Johnson

Genre: Young Adult -Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy
Publishing Date: April 21st, 2012
Page Count: 228
Source: Sent to me by the author
Format: E-Book

Description from Goodreads.com:
I never heard him come after me and even as I climbed the slope and stumbled into our shaded back lawn, I didn't look back. It was like the day the gnomes chased me all over again, but this time I was not escaping some horrible little creatures, I was fleeing from an incredibly good-looking guy who could very well understand me completely. I was either saving myself from that serial killer I always imagined lived down in the swamp, or I had finally gone over the deep end...

Meghan Elam has been strange her entire life: her eyes have this odd habit of changing color and she sees and hears things no one else does. When the visions and voices in her head start to get worse, she is convinced that her parents will want to drag her off to another psychiatrist. That is, until the mysterious Cade MacRoich shows up out of nowhere with an explanation of his own.

Cade brings her news of another realm where goblins and gnomes are the norm, a place where whispering spirits exist in the very earth, and a world where Meghan just might find the answers she has always sought.

Review:
Now, most of you know that Urban Fantasy is not the genre for me. I usually can't get into them, but Faelorehn turned out to break that usual stigma of mine. I am not saying that I am jumping on the Urban Fantasy bandwagon, but I am jumping on The Otherworld Trilogy bandwagon.

Faelorehn gets a lot of its plot and inspiration from Celtic Mythos, and I think that it was really won me over. The Celtic myths were very interesting to learn about and instead of having to deal with a story where everything is made up and you have to just try to believe it, you are dealing with things that were once or still are believe to be true. It was definitely a very different experience, and one that I really enjoyed. If you are unfamiliar with Celtic Myths but have read any YA or fiction dealing with greek mythology it is pretty similar, reading experience wise.

The characters in this novel were very well done. Meghan was a very likable character and made it easy to kind of body swap with her and understand where she is coming from. The only thing I didn't like about Meghan is how she doesn't listen to Cade about who not to trust and that once she starts figuring out who she is she hides it from her friends (I get that part), but then lets the fact that she can't tell them completely change her. She goes from being a pretty happy girl who hangs out with her friends all the time to a completely depressed girl who never leaves the house. Obviously her friends see this change in her and bother her about it, but she can't tell them the truth so it just ensues a bunch of problems with her friends. I mean she could probably fill at least her girl friends, the ones who actual notice a change in her, in at least a little bit. Her friends were all very well done with each of their own very unique personalities. Cade was a little harder to figure out since he is a very complicated person, but I hope to figure more out about him in book two.

I think the story was very well written and compelling. I love that the chapters had titles, because then I knew where to stop if I was getting tired, because based on the titles I knew if I kept going I would be sucked in to finish and then be completely sleep deprived lol. I absolutely love that it is based on myth, because it made it so much more interesting. I also love that it is based on Celtic mythos, because I have  never heard of them before so it was a completely new experience. I think the ending was fairly good. It wasn't a bad note, but it also wasn't necessarily a good note. When reading the ending I felt like I was reading a movie script, and I liked that.

Overall:
Faelorehn was very well done. I really loved that it was based on Celtic mythos, because it was a very new and wonderful experience. I loved how all the characters were easily identifiable and didn't all start to blend. They stayed true to themselves. I am very interested to learn more about Cade's character, though, because he was very complicated in this book and I hope he will show more of himself in book two. If you are one who likes myths then this is definitely a book to look into, and even if you haven't read a book based on myth's before but are into YA or Urban Fantasy you still might want to look into this.

Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 4/5




**The book cover, info, and description were all borrowed from it's Goodreads.com page. That page has been linked back to on two occasions. All other work and opinions are of my own creation. This novel was sent to me by the author in exchange for an honest review.**