Yet another dreary read! This wouldn’t have been so bad if not for the namby-pamby heroine and the typical YA hero..
The heroine (whose name escapes me) keeps whining and is so full of doubt that far from making her human, it makes her dreadfully irritating. She whines so much that there were times when I wanted to tell her that by all means, please retire and let someone else take over.
The hero, Gharaine (I remember his name, imagine that!) is the typical brooding hero. Seriously, what is up with that? The first time the heroine meets him, he tries to kill and the only reason he doesn’t is because a horse saves her. Yep, a horse. Not because halfway through the act, Gharaine had second thoughts. Even after, he clearly regrets not killing her. And here’s the really annoying part, she still fell for him. The first time she interacts with him is also when she meets the other Riders, some of whom were really nice and decent. But no, she still had to go for the guy who clearly didn’t want her. When I read this, it made me wonder, just what message is the author trying to send (is she even conscious of what message she is sending) that the guys worth going for are the ones who ignore you and treat you like an afterthought. I’m not saying that Gharaine was a turd throughout, he does eventually warm up to her and then of course, BOOM! It’s LOVE. But between the insta-love and his awful behaviour before, it really made me wonder what changed… But more importantly, that the heroine was still drawn to the one guy who was awful to her when she was surrounded by guys who treated her nicely.
Fine, we learn that Gharaine carried a lot of guilt, blaming himself for his mother’s death because he was under the spell of a powerful sorceress who was very beautiful. So he became distrustful of beautiful women…. Ooooookay. So instead of blaming the one responsible, he decided to treat all beautiful girls with suspicion because that’s what rational people do.
So yet again, the girl goes for the guy who’s a jerk. As much as I wish this was unique to YA, it isn’t, this trend is just as prevalent in Adult fiction and everything else in between. There were so many irritants in this book, It is hard to list them all, nor do I think this book warrants that kind of effort.
What a waste of time. Having said that, I might still read the second book. I liked the sister, Eve much better than the main protagonist (plus I remember her name so that says something) let’s see how pans out…
Ravings of a Manic Reader 