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Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Review: Elemental : The First (Elemental #1) by Alexandra May


Title: Elemental : The First (Elemental #1)
Author: Alexandra May
Started: 28/8/2011
Finished: 30/8/2011
Goodreads | Review List

Goodreads Synopsis: 

Rose Frost receives a bracelet on her sixteenth birthday, a parting gift from her mother who claims it is a family heirloom. From that night Rose starts having vivid dreams which make no sense.

Days after, her family separate and Rose moves into her grandmother’s house in Warminster, Southern England. Rose remembers happy childhood holidays with her grandmother, and is eager to rekindle her friendship with Hannah and Mira, the two girls she played with as a child. 

Rose’s dreams start to involve a woman called Halíka Dacomé. A legend or a figment of her imagination, she knows not, but her grandmother, Daisy, remains reluctant to talk about the subject. One night a freak fire occurs but when the fuel tank of a car explodes Aiden Deverill pulls Rose to safety. But not before the fire burns her face. She uses her healing gift to heal the scars and to all appearances remains unscathed. But Aiden is unhurt too and Rose doesn’t know why. 

She is drawn to him in a way she cannot fathom but as he tries to get closer her friends warn her off claiming that he’s bad news. Rose tries to find out more about Halika Dacomé and why Aiden is so disliked, but she soon gets drawn into helping her friends solve the mystery behind the missing Warminster townsfolk. 

The latest missing person is her new friend Jez’s father. During the investigation she meets Morgan, who lives in the cottage at the bottom of Daisy’s garden but his enmity towards Aiden Deverill and his grandfather, Ben, lies rooted in a shocking event that happened years before. 

For Rose, her new life is beginning but she soon realises that people are not always what they seem. What she always believed to be a happy family and a friendly town soon turns on its head when she discovers that her family secret and the truth behind Halíka Dacomé is at the heart of the whole conspiracy.

Review: 

Elemental and everything about this book was unpredictable. I was amazed at how the writing immediately drew me in. It was neither boring or blah if you know what I mean. It was written with the right amount of detail and creativity from the author. She showed confidence and determination in her writing and thats exactly the kind of feel each book needs to have. Confidence and Determination.

Our protagonist is a 16 year old gifted girl named Rose who I was glad to notice was a little bit more mature than the other teens I've been reading on about in different types of YA books. But that particular thought was destroyed by an incident during a meaningless fight that could have been avoided if it weren't for her exaggerations and meaningless talk. I know that its how some teens are. They're winey and manage to always magnify a tiny problem and authors are just portraying what they see in teens in general.

The best part about Rose was that she was mature enough to measure her priorities and always manages to come up with a plan during drastic moments. I did enjoy the secondary characters even though I had a bad feeling about all of them from the beginning. I wasn't keen on any of them and I thought from the moment they popped into the story that they'd end up turning the tables and ended up being the bad guys. But in books, its a scenario that always seem to happen. The plot is stable and runs along very nicely it didn't seem slow but was well paced which reminded me a lot of how Cynthia Hand wrote Unearthly (also another book that I loved completely). This was a new reading experience for me.

Alexandra May has a wonderful perception of writing and is gifted with such a beautiful talent. Shes managed to write with an easy flow words and a strong plot and amazing characters that will turn into a magnificent series that will surely spread worldwide like wildfire. Teens will surely love this read.


Awesome book! You must read it! 



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