Title: Reave
Author: C. Miller
Series: Reave (book # 1)
Date Published: Dec. 4, 2013
Rating: 4/5 stars
Author: C. Miller
Series: Reave (book # 1)
Date Published: Dec. 4, 2013
Rating: 4/5 stars
Author Bio:
C. Miller lives in Kentucky with her husband, a Weimaraner that is very suitably named Pig, and a fluffy cat named Poo that gets accented voiceovers periodically throughout the day. She spends most her time taking solitary trips to Writer Land. If she isn’t there, you can usually find her playing video games with her husband or staring off blankly into space while contemplating over what to do during her next trip.
Synopsis:
How far would you go to be free—to make your own choices without being subjected to punishment for doing what you felt was right?
Could you kill for it?
After being abandoned by her father as a child, Aster spent ten years of her life as a servant for the leader’s House in the broken city of New Bethel. She’d known, even as a child, that the cities of her world were corrupt places with human monsters—assassins—running rampant between their high walls.
Thinking everything will remain the same as it always has there, Aster is startled to discover that one day . . . the cycle breaks. As a young new leader takes a strange and—at times—horrifying interest in her, will she be capable of discovering the reasons behind his actions and orders?
In a world where nothing is as it seems and all things are never anywhere near as simple as they appear at first glance, will she be capable of making the distinction between what is real and what is not? Will she find anyone at all she can trust? More importantly . . . Does she have the strength to do what is necessary to survive in a world filled with evil?
Could you kill for it?
After being abandoned by her father as a child, Aster spent ten years of her life as a servant for the leader’s House in the broken city of New Bethel. She’d known, even as a child, that the cities of her world were corrupt places with human monsters—assassins—running rampant between their high walls.
Thinking everything will remain the same as it always has there, Aster is startled to discover that one day . . . the cycle breaks. As a young new leader takes a strange and—at times—horrifying interest in her, will she be capable of discovering the reasons behind his actions and orders?
In a world where nothing is as it seems and all things are never anywhere near as simple as they appear at first glance, will she be capable of making the distinction between what is real and what is not? Will she find anyone at all she can trust? More importantly . . . Does she have the strength to do what is necessary to survive in a world filled with evil?
Review:
This month I’m reviewing Reave, C. Miller’s debut novel. I give it four stars. Miller writes in active voice, which I really liked. Reave had a great plot and subplot, with all sorts of Easter egg clues hidden that when everything is added up at the end, suddenly make perfect sense, but I was less enthralled with the characters. I kept finding myself stopping to scratch my head and wonder “huh?”, “seriously?” and “What’s wrong with them?”
My favorite character was Aggie, even though she wasn’t a main character. Aggie was crucial to the protagonist, Aster’s, character development as her surrogate mother. She did everything she could to protect Aster, even though her advice was always really bad and led to Aster becoming a bit of a man-hater which definitely added to the drama ‘cause she had this boyfriend and she also had these dude issues and was constantly freaking out. Really, Aster seemed slightly bi-polar. At times she was made of steel and snark, but at others the only way I can think of to describe her is as a frightened little rabbit with no mind of her own. I didn’t like that for someone supposedly so cynical, intelligent, and observant Aster was ignorant and clueless. Honestly, she just seemed retarded most of the time. Add in Chase, the big bad assassin who cries ALL the time, and enough said about the characters.
While I do like Miller’s active writing style, she very rarely gives descriptions making it extremely hard to picture what’s going on. Despite all of that, I really did enjoy Reave and will keep an eye out for the next book in the series. You should totally go out and read it.
My favorite character was Aggie, even though she wasn’t a main character. Aggie was crucial to the protagonist, Aster’s, character development as her surrogate mother. She did everything she could to protect Aster, even though her advice was always really bad and led to Aster becoming a bit of a man-hater which definitely added to the drama ‘cause she had this boyfriend and she also had these dude issues and was constantly freaking out. Really, Aster seemed slightly bi-polar. At times she was made of steel and snark, but at others the only way I can think of to describe her is as a frightened little rabbit with no mind of her own. I didn’t like that for someone supposedly so cynical, intelligent, and observant Aster was ignorant and clueless. Honestly, she just seemed retarded most of the time. Add in Chase, the big bad assassin who cries ALL the time, and enough said about the characters.
While I do like Miller’s active writing style, she very rarely gives descriptions making it extremely hard to picture what’s going on. Despite all of that, I really did enjoy Reave and will keep an eye out for the next book in the series. You should totally go out and read it.
Excerpt:
The world, with wretched cities filled with evil people, was not made for happiness. I always heard stories about those cities when I was young. Once, before my father disappeared, he took me close enough to see one of them, but only just.