Angelfire {ARC review} * * *

Angelfire by Courtney Allison Moulton

Feb 15, 2011

- YA, paranormal, fantasy, romance -

reviewed by Tara SG

received for review via Around the World Tours

Book Order (Angelfire)

1. Angelfire * * * (02.15.2011)
2. Wings of the Wicked (2012)
3. Hymn to the Fallen (2013)

Links

Author’s Website : www.courtneyallisonmoulton.com

Amazon : *pre-order* hardcover / eBook

Add To Your GoodReads TBR List

This book in 6 words:

interesting new mythology and complicated romance

Why did I read this? And am I glad I did?

I came across this in one of Abigail’s fantastic cover art posts at All Things Urban Fantasy and then was given the opportunity to review it thanks to Around the World Tours. While I’m glad I read it, it wasn’t all that I hoped it would be. The mythology is well-developed, but wasn’t overly original. The romance was sweet, but I wanted more and was highly disappointed with developments in the end. The lead girl had a few kick-ass moments, but when she was it felt too out of character. Overall, I think this was a decent debut and I’ll still check out future books in the series (but probably via review or from the library).

Brief Summary

When seventeen-year-old Ellie starts seeing reapers – monstrous creatures who devour humans and send their souls to Hell – she finds herself on the front lines of a supernatural war between archangels and the Fallen and faced with the possible destruction of her soul.

A mysterious boy named Will reveals she is the reincarnation of an ancient warrior, the only one capable of wielding swords of angelfire to fight the reapers, and he is an immortal sworn to protect her in battle. Now that Ellie’s powers have been awakened, a powerful reaper called Bastian has come forward to challenge her. He has employed a fierce assassin to eliminate her – an assassin who has already killed her once.

While balancing her dwindling social life and reaper-hunting duties, she and Will discover Bastian is searching for a dormant creature believed to be a true soul reaper. Bastian plans to use this weapon to ignite the End of Days and to destroy Ellie’s soul, ending her rebirth cycle forever. Now, she must face an army of Bastian’s most frightening reapers, prevent the soul reaper from consuming her soul, and uncover the secrets of her past lives – including truths that may be too frightening to remember.

- via GoodReads.com

Plot/Pacing/Writing Style

The history and mythology was interesting, but with how popular both angels and past-life stories are right now it didn’t feel overly unique. I liked the mystery of who/what Ellie is, however, at times it was a little too frustrating that Will wouldn’t tell her more. I felt like most of the book was best fitted for teens, but there were some slightly graphic fight scenes and underage drinking. The overall mystery/big threat was a tad too mysterious for my taste, but I feel like we’ll learn more about everything in the upcoming books.

I got a little frustrated with the pacing wanting it to move a little faster, but overall I read it in one sitting without it feel like it was dragging too badly.

Characters

Ellie and her friends were WAY too rich girl for me. The brand name dropping made me not like them. Aside from that, she was pretty likeable. I enjoyed her sense of humor and felt like the way she dealt with learning about her identity in the beginning was believable. However, after a while I felt like she was depending on Will a lot for someone who also believed they were more powerful than him.

I liked Will and think his devotion to Ellie is beyond impressive. I don’t know if the author was purposefully channeling The Princess Bride every time he said “As you wish.” to Ellie, but it seems highly likely that she was. Their banter back in forth was fun and I liked the mystery of who/what he was as well as why he was with her. I feel like there is still a lot we’re going to learn about our hero. *Slight Spoiler* While I completely understand why he felt the way the way he did after learning new info at the end of this book, I was not happy about it.

I hate Ellie’s dad and just know that there is more to it than we understand. On the other hand, I liked Ellie’s mom, but felt like she let Ellie get away with way too much.

Favorite Quotes

“I guess it’s true that loves makes you blind.”

“No,” my mom said. “It doesn’t make you blind. You’re very, very aware of everything about the one you truly love, whether you know it from what your eyes tell you or your heart. So no, love doesn’t make you blind. It paralyzes you until you can’t breathe or run away from it.”

- I think this quote has a lot of truth to it and is deeper than I expected in a book for this age group.

Recommendations

If you like YA fantasy/paranormal then I would say to give this a try. Maybe borrow it from a friend or the library though.

Going Deeper – NO spoilers

As a non-religious person I’m always a little worried of the “message” in books about angels. I didn’t mind the religion based mythology in this one. It wasn’t about mass religion as we know it but more about making demons and angels real and not discussing how humans deal with their faith.