Once again I took a swing at a new series, and, with all the rave this book has, was disappointed. First off, the story line is a little bland with some dull chapters I had to force myself to get through. There wasn’t the action that I normally like pulling me along. I felt I had to force myself to keep going.

My second point, the characters were a little bland. Yeah! We meet Marik who is good with people and has a joking nature about him, but we only see him skin deep. I thought the two new characters in this book were a nice change, but we didn’t really get to understand them. For example: How dedicated is Marik to his task? Yes, he’s risking his life, but he also decided to turn his back on his queen. And Jinky. I truly loved her unsmiling nature. She added some attitude to this book, but we never saw why she was like that. Why does she like black? Truly, throughout the book, there were two, maybe three, instances were we saw past her tough mask.

Third time’s a charm, right? No. My third warning is this; the romance in this book was shriveled up to a raisin. I felt as if the author was riding on the history between Kat and Jack. These two were alone, I’m just talking alone, maybe once in this book. And they decided to take a hike. Really, how can you have a nice conversation while on a hike?

Other than my obvious disappointment in this book, it was an okay book. My opinion may be based on the fact that I had heard a lot of good about it. For a good read with a little mythology, I think it was a good book, but I had been expecting a little more. For anyone who liked the rest of the series or a calmer, slow paced book, I would recommend this title.