Review- Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Title: Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Author: Laini Taylor
Publisher: Little Brown Books for Young Readers
Find it here: Amazon, Goodreads
Source: Purchased

Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages--not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers--beautiful, haunted Akiva--fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

My thoughts: 

For some reason I was so opposed to reading this book. I saw it all over the blogosphere, people just raving about it after they read their advanced coping. I kept thinking to myself that I’m not going to read it or buy it and I’m just not going to do it! I always thought that the cover was gorgeous and the title was cool but I didn’t like the sound of the synopsis. It sounded like every other YA book out there right now. And then the worst happened!! I got it for my birthday. SO now the book is sitting there on my shelf, staring at me, just daring me to pick it up and start it. Of course I wouldn’t be writing this review if I didn’t give in.

I absolutely loved Daughter of Smoke and Bone. I love everything about it and I honestly can’t say one bad thing. It’s exactly what everyone says it is: beautiful, exotic, enticing, and completely surprising. It’s very well written, mature and Taylor’s characters are well-rounded and realized. I’ve honestly never read another book like it!

Karou is an amazing main character. A blue-haired force of nature who collects languages. How completely awesome! I wish I could collect languages without the hassle of actually having to learn them. A traveler who has seen more of the world than she cares to admit, she lives in Europe as an art student. Raised by a few chimeras, she grew up believing she was abandoned by her human parents and found by this half-man, half-beast creature. She grew up traveling through portals which have taken her all around the world so she could collect bones for Brimstone.

Akiva is by far my favorite character and I have a serious literary crush on him. He haphazardly runs into Karou while she is on one of her bone gathering missions and she takes him by surprise so completely that he just has to find out who she is. His pursuit of her leads to her discovery of who she is and where she came from. Everything that I love about Akiva is learned after this one huge moment in the book! But I can’t say anything about his amazing qualities without giving away spoilers and I don’t give away spoilers!

I love the while concept that Brimstone does his business dealings in the currency of wishes. These wishes are put into physical form depending on the size of the wish. Karou wears a necklace of tiny beads, which in reality is a tiny wish such as her hair growing blue or exacting her revenge on a few of her classmates. I also love the whole setting of the book. It’s at a European art school and I would have loved to see her best friend’s marionette art project. I really hope there is more Akiva in the next book! I’m so excited for it!!

I also had the opportunity of meeting Laini Taylor.  She is so awesome and so very creative! If I didn't work for Disney, I would have a hard time deciding of dying my hair blue or pink.  All of us at Mysterious Galaxy had a great time!