Book Review: Hawthorn By Jamie Cassidy

The point of a review is to review a story for people considering it, not to ruin that by divulging everything. I'll try and keep the actual story line and themes out of this review so I don't ruin it for potential readers. 

Hawthorn

Darkling Saga book 1

Amos Cassidy writing as Jamie Cassidy

 

 

 

 

The first chapter gets straight into it. The way of the writing and the language sets me up for how the rest of the book is going to flow and I already love it. By the end of the first chapter I'm already hooked and that's hard to come by. With its stomach churning mini cliffhanger into the next chapter I'm already hooked and looking for my next excuse to read a bit more. 

I liked how each chapter was written as if by one of the family members each time (three out of the five family members contribute). Sometimes the one sided perspective of a first person narrative can get a bit boring but all areas are covered by each of the different peoples POV's. Saying this, I was dubious about how she would fair doing a chapter by a 5 year old but she kept those short and sweet and they really add important bits to the story. 

Another positive was that it moved at a nice pace. It wasn't 10 chapters of nothing to begin with except scene setting nor was it go go go from the first paragraph. Just enough to keep you interested and involved with the impending storyline and learning about the characters at the same time. I dislike trying to feel empathy for characters I don't have a chance to know or understand. The flipside to this is having the characters bio, family history etc rammed into every sentence. This had a nice balance.

The second part of the book felt slightly different. It was a bit more fast paced with more stuff happening with the main character. I liked how she didn't waste paragraphs filling the gaps and instead just moved swiftly onto the relevant periods of time. We hear from the other two characters in this part as well as the other three from the first, switching between when the storyline called for it without it being too jumbled. It had a nice flow to it and a characters chapter only lasted as long as it needed to and was extended into another chapter when more was to be told.

The only thing I struggled with a bit was when they switched from conscious to dream state. Sometimes it wasn't too clear which was which and I had to re-read a paragraph to determine the line. Sometimes it wasn't a dream state, like another realm state and that confused me a bit. 

Part three definitely moved quicker than the previous two. Pieces are being brought together and the built up storyline starts coming together. I was hooked, trying to get to the next chapter to see what everyone else was going through but we stick with the main character more on this side.

A new character/creature gets introduced here with a new truth for one of our heroines. With this new revelation follows a deep chapter explaining the back story in greater detail. There's a lot to take in here with its twists and turns but it's not difficult to follow if you're paying attention. It's told in a conversation but it's quite long. By the end of it I'd forgotten it was a tale being told by a character but kept me gripped until the end. 

And that's when I get there. The end. What a cliffhanger. Without giving anything away the ending leaves you with a feeling of loss, like you've experienced everything with the characters and aren't satisfied with the ending. As its wrapping up you kind of guess parts of what's going to happen but it's still a surprise when it does. I'm only dissatisfied because I want to know what happens after the final epilogue!  (If you read this book then you'll totally get what I mean when you get there).

Whilst I'm sure a second book will continue this story, in the meantime I'm going to sit pouting because I'll have to wait. 

This book had me smiling, gasping, trying to read quicker to see what happened next.... One of those books that has you so intrigued you can't put it down and when you do you wish you hadn't. It's a book with a teeny vibe but more adult than most with the language and sexual 'happenings' in which things are implied or assumed without going full on 50 Shades but without the naive, innocence that most teen fantasy books give you.

I'd recommend this book thoroughly and can't wait for the next one.