Daughter of Smoke and Bone was an absolutely excellent book. That being said however, while it was in the Young Adult Reader and classified as Ages 15 and Up on Amazon, I think it is a mature book that is worth discussing/talking about with tweens. The thing with Tweens is that they are all about pop culture. I should know, I'm 23 and I LOVE pop culture. I stumbled onto this book on Good Reads and was intrigued a) by the cover and b) because of all the rave reviews I was reading. As soon as I got past it though, the book was absolutely amazing. It has great vivid detail and keeps the reader on the edge of his/her seat trying to find out where Karou's adventures are going to take her. However, it has extremely mature content, to borrow from Gossip Girl's scandalous Campaign Marketing: OMFG. I nearly had a heart attack in the first few chapters about how mature it got. It is interesting how the writer portrays this because the OMFG moments are not even the themes of the book. The book is about True Love and reiterating the theme that Shakespeare and James Cameron so poignantly point out stating that "true love never ends." I think the book is really great, however, I do not think it is really appropriate for Tweens unless it is discussed/read with another adult as well. This is so the Tween can enjoy the "pop culture" that all the other kids are talking about and having a fellow "tween" reader not recklessly recommending the book without discussing "mature" themes.
Summary: Daughter of Smoke and Bone is a sort of "urban fantasy" in which the setting is the normal world, however, there is a constant battle between Chimeras (hell demons) and Angels. The story centers on Karou, a 17-year-old girl who lives in Prague and goes to art school. However, the reader's first impression of a seemingly normal girl is axed right away when our blue haired heroine has more to her than meets the first page. Karou, while not attending art school with her best friend Zuzanna, runs errands for a Chimera named Brimstone. Brimstone and his counterparts are her family in which we realize that she has none. Her gift in return for the errands completed is being able to have wish beads. While on an errand for Brimstone, something terrible goes wrong and Karou is thrust into a world in which she knows nothing about. Cut off from her "family" Karou meets an angel named Akiva, embittered by the death of his lover and is stripped of his dreams for a new and better world order. It is only then through her relationship with Akiva that she realizes that she is a reborn again Chimera and she must "save" Brimstone and her family despite her feelings for Akiva and the opposition of Angels and Chimeras.
Ashleigh's opinion: This was an absolutely wonderful book. I was really taken aback how good it was actually. It was at its a heart, a love story at the center of war and turmoil, much like Star Wars, Pearl Harbor or Titanic, however, you could almost tell that while there is that moment of superficiality that exists in Romeo and Juliet when the two protagonist first meet each other, their love is explored and it is deeper for reasons unknown. The book was a great combination of balancing love and pain and did not have the typical paranormal romance plot: girl meets boy, girl falls in with boy, boy decides they cannot be together...Daughter of Smoke and Bone was much more. Girl saves boy, boy decides to dedicate 2 years of his life to find her, boy and girl reunite, girl and boy imagine a better world, girl decides, boy is devastated...
Genre Level: Fantasy, SciFi
Reading Level: 15+
Theme: Love, Death, Revenge, Family despite differences, Dystopia,
If you look this, then look at: The City of Bones series by Cassandra Clare, The Fallen Series, Romeo and Juliet, The Vampire Diaries (You have to read it to understand why, just remember the term doppelganger)
Awards:
- AMAZON TOP TEN BOOKS OF 2011
- AMAZON #1 TEEN BOOK OF 2011
- YALSA TOP TEN BEST FICTION FOR YOUNG ADULTS, 2012
- A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE CHILDREN'S BOOK OF 2011
- PUBLISHER''S WEEKLY BEST BOOKS OF 2011
- SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL BEST BOOKS OF 2011
- KIRKUS REVIEWS BEST TEEN BOOKS OF 2011
- LOS ANGELES PUBLIC LIBRARY, BEST OF 2011
- CHICAGO PUBLIC LIBRARY, BEST OF THE BEST 2012
- BARNES & NOBLE REVIEW, BEST YA FICTION OF 2011
- LOCUS (MAGAZINE OF SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY) REC READING LIST 2011
- YALSA 2012 READER'S CHOICE BOOKLIST
- A JUNIOR LIBRARY GUILD SELECTION, 2011
- ABC BEST CHILDREN'S BOOK CATALOG, 2011
- starred reviews, PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY, KIRKUS, SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, BCCB, THE HORN BOOK
Characters: Karou/Madrigal- A young girl who has been kept in the dark of her past life in order to protect her from the harsh truths of the world. Her life is completely "semi-normal" until Akiva, an angel meets her and they fall in a bitter and wonderful love.
Akiva- an angel who has sworn to avenge the chimeras who killed his love, he is ready to destroy them all when during a fight with Karou, tilts her head a certain way and he is official smitten with her.
Brimstone- Karou's family
Sequel Information: Days of Blood and Starlight coming Fall 2012
Bibliographic Information: Taylor, Laini. (September 2011). Daughter of Smoke and Bone. Little Brown Books.
Link to Author Site: http://www.lainitaylor.com/
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