Mythology With a Kick or Two

Blood Oath by T.L. Clarke

Disclaimer: I received this book from the author in exchange for a review.

Summary: The battle against pure evil begins. Friendships are betrayed. Rivals bond...and powers collide.

Gabrielle discovers that everything she has known to be true is a lie...just smoke and mirrors to disguise a deadly world filled with creatures with one goal--to kill.

Review: An enjoyable young adult fantasy book with an interesting mythology that suffers from young adult book tropes.

The mythology is what really saved this book for me. I love mythology, especially anything relating to Greek or Roman mythology. There was a great deal of Greek mythology in this book along with some twists and new mythology developed by the author. Plus, there’s a boarding school for the Elementals to attend and I love me some magic school action. While I did enjoy this book, my enjoyment was marred by a few things.

First and foremost, I was sick of everything being heart shaped, including lips. What are heart shaped lips? And people have other head shapes than heart shaped. Gabrielle did not need to describe everything she and everyone else was wearing and people do wear jeans that aren’t skinny. And there are the requisite jerky boys that are mean to the main female character one minute and then civil or even nice the next. I get that the boys are attractive (also, why are all the Ares warriors in training attractive?), but you don’t have to be attracted to the person if they are a jerk. And Gabrielle is super special although that does have an explanation. I liked this book enough to be interested in the first book (reading it out of order) and the rest of the series, but I hope that the tropes and repetition are less.

Rating:






Recommendation: I would recommend this book to those that enjoy young adult fantasy fiction, mythology, or stories about magic boarding schools.