Review: Dark Star

Goodreads Summary: Audrey Whitticomb has nothing to fear. Her mother is the superhero Morning Star, the most deadly crime-fighter in the Twin Cities, so it's hard for Audrey not to feel safe. That is, until she's lured into the sweet night air by something human and not human--something with talons and teeth, and a wide, scarlet smile.

Now Audrey knows the truth: her mom doesn't fight crime at night. She fights Harrowers--livid, merciless beings who were trapped Beneath eons ago. Yet some have managed to escape. And they want Audrey dead, just because of who she is: one of the Kin.

To survive, Audrey will need to sharpen the powers she has always had. When she gets close to someone, dark corners of the person's memories become her own, and she sometimes even glimpses the future. If Audrey could only get close to Patrick Tigue, a powerful Harrower masquerading as human, she could use her Knowing to discover the Harrowers' next move. But Leon, her mother's bossy, infuriatingly attractive sidekick, has other ideas. Lately, he won't let Audrey out of his sight.

When an unthinkable betrayal puts Minneapolis in terrible danger, Audrey discovers a wild, untamed power within herself. It may be the key to saving her herself, her family, and her city. Or it may be the force that destroys everything--and everyone--she loves.

I went into this thinking that I was going to get the superhero YA novel that I had always wanted...and it didn't quite deliver. It wasn't really superheroes the way that comic book geeks like me think of them, but pretty epic in its own rights. Which after skimming the Goodreads summary in its entirety, which I hadn't really done and had mostly been going off the epic hype for the novel, I see how wrong I was. I guess I was just really embracing the narrator; believing wholeheartedly that the world was "safe" and there were REAL LIFE FREAKING SUPERHEROES! [Seriously, how epic would that be?!]


Speaking of which, in case you couldn't already tell, I loved Audrey. She had serious attitude, was pretty snarky, and wholeheartedly believed her mother was a superhero. [Though, to be honest, haven't we all believed that of our mothers at one point or another?] I could just really relate to her and I loved her narration, she was the kind of protagonist I wholeheartedly WANT to follow around.

I loved the peripheral characters that we haven't spent a great deal of time with like Shane and Tink and Ester and the cousins and I'm hoping to get more time with them in the sequel. [Like, ideally I'd want some spinoff novellas or short stories from their perspectives! I'd kind of like to see things through their eyes.] Also, I kind of adore Leon which goes against every previous book crush I've ever had...at least I'm pretty sure it did. He wasn't a bad boy...he wasn't an uber geek...he was just Leon and I kind of just really liked him from the beginning.

I loved that they weaved in a form of Tarot, into the knowing. I loved her abilities, I loved the variety of the abilities that were available for Kin. And I really liked the mythology behind the Kin, how their story wasn't quite so typical and especially the way that it was originally brought to the reader's attention and then later re-explained. [It sounds kind of weird here, but trust me it was GREAT.] Kind of like how fairy tales are originally told to a child to explain something and then you get the "facts" as an adult. Yeah. Like that! Anyway, LOVED it.

I couldn't put this book down from the moment that I skimmed the first page, even after I found out it wasn't quite what I had been promised I was still entranced by it and had to know what was going to happen. Oh the paper cuts I endured from rapid flipping!  literally just flew right through. This book was utterly unputdownable and a riveting change from what I had been reading as of late. Exactly what the Doctor ordered!.

4/5