Angel Arias by Marianne de Pierres

Book blurb:

Retra - now called Naif - has escaped from Ixion, the island of ever-night. She doesn't know if her friends on the island survived the battle between the Ripers and the rebels. But she does know that she must return home, behind the sealed walls of Grave, to find out why the Ripers have been seen there talking to the councillors. What links the two worlds?

First she must convince Ruzalia to help her. The fierce pirate captain saves those who face terrible fates on Ixion, but that doesn't guarantee their gratitude. Instead, she faces a revolt - and Naif is caught in the middle.

Naif will need all her courage to survive. For Lenoir, who wants to keep her safe, for her friends Suki and Rollo, if they live, for Markes, who has secrets of his own, and for the new friends she will make on this journey.

The fate of worlds depends on it

---------------------o_O-------------------

Hahahaa… don’t you just love it when blurbs ends with an ominous sentence?? Somehow they just make the book that much more compelling… And the cover, argh! Absolutely drool-worthy.

And so, onwards to the actual review!

When I first picked up Burn Bright, I admit, it was because of the gorgeous cover. When I picked up Angel Arias it was also partly because of the gorgeous cover, but also because I was curious about the fate of Naif/ Retra and her gang of misfits.
And so, I dove back into the mystifying, terrifying and whatever else–fying world, created by Marianne de Pierres.

And….I hate to have to say this… I wasn’t completely disappointed. But somehow I expected something a tad better, what I mean is that I wanted something more. The ending bugged me, the book seemed slightly repetitive and things dragged on for a while…

**BEWARE ALL YE WHO CONTINUE—THERE WILL BE SPOILERS**

Ok, now that I’ve got the warning out of the way...
The ending was, in my opinion, rushed. There was no lead up. There was no reason, no story to it. I have yet to read the third book, but from what I’ve read in Angel Arias, the betrayal was completely ridiculous. Yes, it was inevitable that someone was going to betray them, but why Gurney? Or whatever his name is. Why Gurney?

Perhaps I skimmed past the section where it was explained, and I sincerely apologize if I did, and you’ll have to bear with me.

Anyway, all whist Jarrod was helping Naif, he kept mentioning this Gurney fellow, ah yes, Gurney. And so they enlist the help of Gurney who is a slightly odd character who finds them the location of the “secret meeting” in which all will make sense, and smuggles them there. Whoop-de-doo.

And then what? Well, pretty much nothing. They FINALLY get the information they came for, arrive at the old harbor with a few minor distractions and then, the horror, they realise that someone has betrayed them all, giving the Wardens (is that what they’re called?) their location and exposing them. Oh Noes.

Hmmm. Who could it possibly be? The quiet girl, that was Markes betrothed to? Jarrod, the girl’s brother and their newest ally?
No. It was Gurney. Who, Gurney!? Yes Gurney.
WHY?!?! I CRY! WHY?!?! I just don’t understand the lead up to this, why was HE the one to betray them, what was his motive?
Phew. Now that that’s off my chest, I can continue with the rest of the review. And again, I apologize if I misread the entire ending, I tend to do that :)

**THE SPOILER HAS ENDED, FEEL FREE TO READ THE REST OF THIS REVIEW AT YOUR LEISURE**

Ok. Apart from my little spat with the ending, all is good. The concept of the book is one that is undoubtedly interesting, dark, twisted etc, I’m sure I’ve said it before.

I’m not sure how I feel about the “main” characters; I don’t feel as though I have any sort of attachment to them, not one bit. I’m not sure if it’s because of their lack of background, or maybe it’s the way they act.

Naif/ Retra. She annoyed me. And again, I’m not entirely sure why. Come to think of it, I’m not sure of a lot of things. I think it may be because of how she contradicts herself at times. In the previous book she was free from her “Seal self” and then in this book some of it has returned? I’m just a little confused at that. Then there’s the fact that she pines after Markes who frankly, is a fool. I don’t like him; he has no real character, someone who is always so conveniently there. He’s a splodge on the page, a splodge put in so that some dementicated (new word by the way) love triangle can form. Eugh.

And Gurney, oh noes, don’t even get me started on what a stranger, if that's the right word, he was, he was just THERE, he was the one that filled in the gaps, the one who freaking ended the story. Refer back to spoiler section if you desperately want to know.

The only person I found interesting was Liam, one of the humans who were fused with a Night Creature, only the process went wrong and they were sent to Grave to spy for Lenoir. Oooooh. Oh and Jarrod, who was actually decent! Jarrod was the one who was there and helped the book move along, thank goodness.

I wanted to see more of Lenoir, Rollo and Suki, but all I got were short snippets and odd conversations. I’m thinking there will be more of them in the third book.

The “baddies” of the book were actually quite well developed, excluding Gurney (no, I am not getting over that). The elders, with their secret agendas, the Ripers and other assorted peoples actually made my skin crawl, well it was more the Ripers that did the skin crawling but the Elders were still quite interesting, especially at the ending, when all was revealed… I feel like doing an ominous voice for that last line :D

And so, I conclude that Angel Arias wasn’t exactly awful, but it did lack some teensy tiny bit of decent action, I say decent because the only action occurred when they were running away and that is what we are trying to steer clear of, and plot. I mean seriously, the majority of the book consisted of Naif and Co. running away from the big bad wardens.

I am still very much intrigued by the whole idea, and so I think I’ll still be reading the third book.
These were just my opinions of the book, still read the books if you want to. Just because I didn’t like it doesn’t mean others don’t. And if I got the whole Gurney betrayal thing wrong, I am sincerely sorry and feel free to correct/ scream at me. I can take it. (I think…)

Happy Reading, Ro.

Burn Bright by Marianne de Pierres

“Listen well, baby bats. Burn bright, but do not stray from the paths. Remember, when you live in a place of darkness you also live with creatures of the dark.”

Retra is a Seal, restricted in speaking, in learning, in living… she’s is Sealed off from the outer world. Ixion is the place of ever-night, a place for pleasure and for letting go.

When Retra escapes to Ixion to find her brother, everything that she’s been taught is torn apart. Fighting against her Seal nature to fit in, Retra only draws more attention to herself from not only her fellow escapees but the watching eyes of the Guardians, people, no, creatures who watch over the inhabitants of Ixion...

Ixion may be a place for pleasure, but behind its colourful lights and deafening music there is a darker force at work, one that is coming after Retra.

----------o_O------------
Quick mention on how GORGEOUS the cover is, gorgeous I tell you. I love the paint streaks and splatters. It’s really attention grabbing, my preeeccciiiooooouuussss….

**strokes cover**
Ahem—excuse me.

Anyway, Retra, hmm… Well, she’s a very different character, a Seal, she has different behaviours and attitudes. At first I was a little confused but then it eventually all made sense, she’s from a place called Grave, a specific sealed off area where they live restricted lives etc. And so, Retra at first finds it very difficult to assimilate into the different behaviours of Ixion, or so she keeps saying, but to me, she seemed to fit right in. eventually. Still, it seemed a tad quick. And she was kind of contradicting herself sometimes, she’ll say/ think something but do something completely different. Oh well. All part of her character I guess.

I like the idea of how Retra practiced enduring pain (as morbid as that sounds) so that she could find her brother, she’s very noble but again very naïve. And slightly spontaneous. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not but it really helps in developing the story… any time things seem a little slow, add a little spontaneousness and voila! Hehehe. I find it funny that she’ll act out in some things but at other times she’ll freeze up << again contradicting Other than that, I’m not sure what to think of Retra really, she just keeps changing… her character keeps flopping all over the place, she’s a seal. She’s not. She’s brave. She’s not. She’s suicidal (not really). She’s not. You get my point.

The other characters are all very different, having their own strengths and talents, but although Retra makes friends/ allies I feel like I don’t really know them… they’re just names to fill in the space of friend. There’s some history revealed about them but again, it doesn’t really seem personal, more quoting out of a fictitious textbook. To be honest I didn’t even feel that much distress when any of Retra’s friends/ acquaintances were in danger/ dying, because I didn’t really know them. Gosh that sounds cold o_O

There is some sort of relationship/ interest between Retra and Lenoir, and Retra and Markes. I really hope this doesn’t become a weirdly twisted love triangle. Lenoir is one of the leaders of the Ripers who are the island’s mysterious Guardians, but the relationship between Retra and Lenoir is somewhat confusing (read the book and you’ll understand).The relationship between Markes and Retra is kind of weird; it seems to be a one way relationship, with Retra attracted to Markes who is slightly oblivious and dismissive towards her. Gah.

The idea of Burn Bright is very original, exciting, and new. I was completely drawn in by the emotive description of the scenes but I at first failed to see a point in having a world where everyone parties, indulges themselves etc. But of course, as we continue I was proved wrong and things begin to have a meaning, things begin to fall into the place of a more intriguing plot –correction –a creepier plot. In a good way.

Now, there were some pretty confusing things in this book, things were slightly jumpy and again, spontaneous. Things just randomly jump out at you and completely change things in a couple of words. You’ve got characters “bonding” and events careening off the page. Catastrophes, explosions, dead people. Yeah. That’s pretty much it :)

The odd thing, and probably intended thing, is that I still want to read more… the weird and quirky events are actually really riveting (though they’re also quite disturbing), and the story is good in a way that you just can’t predict what’s going to happen. Something that was also really confuzzling (new word :D) were the Guardians and their role on the island but that’s part of the bigger plot mystery so it’s all right, but the annoying thing is I felt like I was just beginning to piece things together… and the book ended. Darn. I hate it when that happens.

The writing is good, especially in the way Marianne de Pierres describes her scenes, she makes them seem magical. The writing is easy to follow and simple but effective. Yah. That’s it. Oh! The book is also a good size, so it won’t take you long to finish it once you get into the story, promise.

Overall, Burn Bright was an excellent start to a new and promising series, filled with dark secrets and creepy crawly things, and romance (maybe? I’m not too sure what to think of the supposed romance) :)