Thursday, 4 August 2011

Antara Review

Antara (Antara #1)
Marilena Mexi

Publisher: Lulu
Release Date:
March 22, 2011
Genre:
YA
Pages:
Kindle Edition
Source:
Author
Rating:
5/5 (Avg 3.5/5)
Peace and tranquility on the island of Aster, home to both humans and 'merfolk', has long been broken by a devastating phenomenon, recurring every five years. A storm including gusting winds and huge waves mysteriously appeared and eradicated much of the population. The misunderstandings, suspicion and hate born of this disaster have torn the two races apart, and the peace loving merfolk are now in a never-ending struggle to prove their innocence and restore peace to the island.

On the human side, things are even worse; under the tyranny of cruel king Orestis, the people suffer and all their king cares for is vengeance against the “fish”, as he spitefully calls them, executing merfolk after merfolk for just being near his lands.

Secrets, intense emotions and strange phenomena will upset their lives forever.

Most of the time, I can specify things about a book that I really, really liked and other things that I didn't like so much. This book is an exception because everything went together so well that it was hard to see anything that I didn't like about it.

I don't know if it was on purpose or not, but the story reads like an old-fashioned fairytale. It was beautifully written and lyrical, sucking you in with just words from the very beginning. The story is very fantasy with a very real issue that is dealt with in our society today, which was a nice little twist. The premise was completely original and, even though the story was short, you came away from the story completely mesmerized and satisfied with what you've read.

I also cannot go without mentioning the romance which was so sweet it almost gave me a tooth ache, but in a good way. As a matter of fact, the scenes between Aster and Orestis were some of my favorite.

I was absolutely blown by the illustrations in this book as well. They added about ten more dimensions to the story that may not have necessarily been needed to make this story so great, but they were definitely a welcome addition to it. I'd love to have prints of all the illustrations to just tack on my wall and stare at all the time.

Overall, this was a fantastic read. I cannot say anything bad or negative about it because it far surpassed my expectations of a YA book and left me speechless!

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