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Friday, March 27, 2020

Review - Kingdom of Souls (Kingdom of Souls, #1) by Rena Barron





Title: Kingdom of Souls (Kingdom of Souls, #1)
Author: Rena Barron
Pages: 496
Publisher: HarperVoyager
Release Date: 3rd September 2019


Blurb from Goodreads:

THERE’S MAGIC IN HER BLOOD.


Arrah is a young woman from a long line of the most powerful witch doctors in the land. But she fails at magic, fails to call upon the ancestors and can't even cast the simplest curse.


Shame and disappointment dog her.


When strange premonitions befall her family and children in the kingdom begin to disappear, Arrah undergoes the dangerous and scorned process of selling years of her life for magic. This borrowed power reveals a nightmarish betrayal and a danger beyond what she could have imagined. Now Arrah must find a way to master magic, or at least buy it, in order to save herself and everything she holds dear.


An explosive fantasy set in a world of magic and legend with a twist you will never see coming.











My Review:

*I received an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thanks to HarperVoyager and NetGalley*






Powerful witch doctors run in Arrah's family, so she isn't the only person disappointed that she has no magic herself.

Children are disappearing and Arrah decides to do something incredibly dangerous - she gives years of her life in order to have magic.

Arrah uncovers dark and terrible secrets that will threaten not only the lives of her family, but also the kingdom itself.

Can Arrah save the children, her family and the kingdom?




The main reason I wanted to read Kingdom of Souls was for the witch doctors, but they weren't in the book as much as I expected.

Arrah was a likeable protagonist and I enjoyed reading about her relationship with her father who she was close to. It must have been so hard for Arrah being a disappointment to her mother and other people for not having magic.

The setting was interesting and I liked the concept of the different gods/orisha.

The plot was quite slow to get going, but I did enjoy it to begin with. However, after a while I found myself becoming bored and I struggled to stay interested in what was going on. I did consider stopping reading, but I was hopeful that the pace and storyline would pick up. I did end up finishing the book, but have to admit that I did skim-read several pages. There was a twist that I didn't see coming, but by that point I wasn't invested in what was happening and just wanted to get to the end, which is a shame as I was looking forward to reading Kingdom of Souls and am disappointed that I didn't enjoy it more.

The writing style was easy enough to follow, but it failed to grip me and hold my attention.

The concept was interesting, but it didn't reach its potential for me.

I won't be continuing with this series.




Overall, this was an okay read.


 



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