BOOK REVIEW 😍
Evenfall by @gajajezernik
Available October 30th, 2018

3 fragmented worlds filled with magic
And only 1 savior to bring them back together again... For the readers who loved Shadow and Bone and Caraval this is your next fix! Check out the latest novel Evenfall by Gaja K. Kos and Boris Kos!
When I read the first page I was instantly transported into the life of Ember, the curious and willful daughter of an elite family in Soltzen. Where woman are just arm decorations with no voice and men who only care about possessions, power and greed.
But when Ember suddenly finds herself in a place of eternal night that she has only dreamed of she must find out why. And it doesn’t help when the first person she encounters tells her that she is the chosen one, born to save their worlds.
But is this deadly power that she contains enough to help close the fragmented worlds again? Or will the Crescent Prince cause her to regret ever landing in Somraque?
Can Ember follow her heart and brave the monster that deserves no name and be able to keep her heart in the process?
Read now to emerge yourself in this enthralling novel that leaves you always wanting more!



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Evenfall by Gaja j. Kos & Boris Kos

I was sent this book as an advanced copy by the publisher via NetGalley for reviewing purposes, but all opinions are my own.

If you are a fan of Sarah j Maas, and Leigh Bardugo you will enjoy this book.

The story starts off with Ember, who doesn’t truly know who she is and what power she possesses until the day she wakes up in an unfamiliar world where she gains the new title of: Savior.

She learns that all her life the Crescent Prince; Mordecai has been searching for her. For her power and what may lay beneath it all. She learns what her true self is and what she may need to do to fix all the wrongs she never even knew about until now.

Evenfall brings together all the best things you could ever want in a YA fantasy book. The cover will draw you in immensely but I promise you; when this book releases on October 30, 2018 you ARE going to want to pick it up! This story is so beautifully written in a way that makes you fall in love with the book and world itself. I am so ready for the sequel already!

“A monster does not deserve the intimacy of a name”

2.5 stars.

I almost DNFed this at 40%, but pushed through because I had hope and with a cover like that, it has t get better...right? And things got a little better around 65%, but it was a little too late.

Here is a really quick overview: Evenfall starts with our MC, Ember, waking up a world that isn't her own. She has no idea where she is or how she got there. She is quickly discovered by a girl who says they have been waiting for her and that Ember needs to come with her now so that they can send her back where she came from before the Crescent Prince finds her. Ember, of course, runs away and into the town where there's a Solstice Festival happening. She encounters and sees all this kind of magic she has never seen before. The girl, Ada, finds her again just before the Prince sees her, and Ada takes her back to her house to have her mother explain what is going on. There is a plot, some confusing back history, whispers of rebellion, and eventually Ember IS captured by said Prince. I will stop there so I don't give too much away.

The issue that I had, and why I almost did not keep reading was that it was entirely boring, unoriginal and the world building wasn't there. The characters were flat and I kept asking myself, why do I care about them? This reminded me A LOT of Alina and The Darkling, except not executed nearly as well.

Ember literally falls into this world as a snowflake. She doesn't know why she is special, but everyone else does, and everyone else wants a piece of her. We don't learn much about her either, she remains pretty one dimensional and there is nothing really interesting about her either. At one point she mentions how the one tool she has is her brain...but she hardly ever uses it. She willingly listens to what Ada and her mother tell her, about she is and is easily swayed to their cause. She also had a LOT of internal monologue, where the author took the liberty of explaining things...but how did Ember know said things? She'd be having a conversation with someone, then there would be a huge pause where were are explained things, but through Ember. It was confusing. Can we also talk about how she was IMMEDIATELY drawn to Mordecai, because he is so incredibly attractive. She constantly swoons over how good looking and attractive she finds him...but he is suppose to be the bad guy right? When she has to interact with him, she makes sure she looks amazing...because why? I think there was a whole point to that but I must have missed it. I guess if she looked nice, he would what, be intimidated? Naw...don't thinks so, there is that brain of her's working again. They both barely know each other, or much less ANYTHING about one another, but they love each other? Ugh....

Let's talk about Mordecai now. I called it at the start of the book that he was actually [ not the villain, but is what the people have made him to be. I liked him a lot more than any of the other characters. He has to potential to be a really layered character. He also reminded me of The Darkling from his physical description and power. Honestly if it wasn't for his character adding something more to the cast, I probably would have put this book down.

The cast of characters. I found nothing interesting or developed about them. There was no depth, no history, nothing relatable about any of them.

The world building, or lack there of. It was there...but it didn't really make sense. And things didn't fall into place until about 70% of the book, and even then I kept asking myself why I should care. We know that there were 3 countries or races of people or...something like that? And one got too power hungry and ended up ripping the world apart into fragments. I couldn't understand if one of them was the void or if the void was just where all the magic was feeding to, and it was expanding for that reason. I have no clue...and that might be my fault because I got to the point of skimming.

I don't know if I would recommend this to anyone. To me, it just wasn't enough, and it reminded me so much of the Grisha series with parts of its storyline and some of its characters.

Advanced reader copy provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

For a reader who loves light and dark/sun and moon tropes, grey characters, magic, and a doubtful protagonist with untested strength, Evenfall did not disappoint. However, there were a few things that did not satisfy me.

Evenfall was a slow read I have to say. It took me a few days to finish the first half of the book. Perhaps it was because I did not wholly like the supporting characters that accompanied our protagonist Ember throughout that period of time. The characters all have so much potential within them but you rarely get to see them grow as individuals and not just as Ember's companions. We only know little information about them and sometimes, when the writing becomes quite confusing and overbearing at some point, I know nothing at all for I understand nothing.

The first half of the book really made me stop and read a few paragraphs again for I had little to no understanding of what was happening or how the author described the world. The world built was really amazing and filled with life. However, as I have mentioned before, it did get confusing at certain points and there were some questions in my mind left unanswered.

Maybe my confusion and my curiosity about everything was what kept me going.

I do not regret anything at all.

I read the second half of the book in a day because I was that immersed in all the fast-paced action and revelations that were being thrown at me all at once. The plot in this part was really eye-opening towards the realities and truths about the three worlds and it does make you question morality and motives, which I absolutely love, especially after reading all those straightforward light-vs.-dark books. Evenfall makes you question and delve deeper into our actions and power.

Ember finally grew on me and I am honestly fond of seeing characters hone their skills and embrace their strength. I did want to see more of her power in this part, though since she felt a bit flat and lost in the first part of the story. The second one may have shown us more scenes of Ember with her strength but sometimes, I felt it was overpowered by some of Ember's narratives. There were parts that I really liked to the point where I would cheer on for Ember and fall in love with how beautiful the sentences were structured. Ember isn't a character that is strong in the physical sense. She's smart yet she has doubts. She is brave yet she is also afraid and to see her grow and embrace herself is really satisfying, especially after the dragging first part of the book.

In all honesty, the most developed character in the book was the Crescent Prince. He's one of my favorite characters in the book (the other being Ember) not just because I love light-and-dark tropes and a character with a villainous presence but because this book shows us more than a fearful ruler. There is still some humanity in him and to discover his motives does make you question the concept of good and evil. Learning more about the Crescent Prince makes me want to take care of him more and I really do hope we get to see more of him in the upcoming book.

Evenfall has a lot of potential. Although confusing at some points, things do finally clear up and set us up for the upcoming events. The first part may be dragging but pushing through is worth it. I do hope that the characters and the other worlds are more developed and talked about by the upcoming books and I do hope Ember grows into something stronger and certain.

Will I read this book again? Most definitely.

Actual Rating: 3.5 Stars!

Evenfall was a unique read, but it was a bit slow for my taste. This is a clear case of it's not you, it's me. It has a gorgeous cover and a tempting synopsis so I couldn't resist requesting it. It was my first Gaja J. Kos book. I loved the concept of this book and the characters were very interesting, but they need more fleshing out. The heroine Ember isn't my favorite protagonist, but I really loved the Crescent Prince Mordecai. He was totally swoon worthy. The romance seemed too insta-lovey. I wish it was a slow burn romance. The writing was beautiful and very much detailed. The world building and the magical aspect was great. They're the best parts I loved about this book.   

The characters weren't bad but I couldn't emotionally connect with them which is one of the major Issue I had with this book besides the slow pace. Ember was an okay-ish character but sometimes she was very annoying. I really want to admire her, but her constant attraction to the prince seemed totally cliched. I don't blame her either because he was a dark charming prince, but I wish she had some self control. Well, coming to Mordecai, he was my favorite character in this book. He's a complex person and boy, he was hiding so many secrets. People believes him to be evil because of his cruel actions. He kinda reminded of darkling with his swirling shadows and all.  The romance wasn't my favorite. I really thought that I would enjoy it but insta-love is one of my book turn-off's. Nevertheless, I'm still rooting for this couple. The secondary character seemed very interesting like Ada, Eriyan, Zaphine, Dantos, and also Ivarr.  They weren't fleshed out well enough and also they were kinda left-out in most of the second half which was a bit disappointing. I really hope we get to know more about them in the next book.

The plot was interesting and unpredictable. There's not much action in this book. If you like slow paced books then you'll definitely enjoy it more than I did. I really liked the sci-fi and magical elements in it. The writing was captivating but some parts seemed overly descriptive. The book was written in Ember's first person POV. I like both singular and multiple POV's, but I think this book should've been great if it was written in multiple POV's. The world building was interesting. It's not too complex, but I wish there's a map to get clear picture of this divided world. The concept of using blood magic to create illusions seemed very fascinating like altering your appearance, deceiving, and creating illusion of Sunlit sky or Starry Sky etc. I would really love to discover more of this magical world.

Despite my issues,  I still think it was a good start to a series and I'll definitely look forward to the next book. I actually wanted to give this a three star, but because of Mordecai, I added another half star to it.

“I didn’t ask to come here.
I never wanted to be anyone’s savior.
I had no desire to be responsible for their lives.
And I certainly did not want to take them.”

This book has the trifecta - a beautiful cover, lovely writing, and a compelling story. Look at that cover, it’s just gorgeous. But I’m sure every reader can relate to an amazing cover and a lacking story. So I was happy to find an engaging plot, unique and developed characters, and detailed world building. Ember is a great main character. But my favorite part of this book was the writing itself. It was lyrical and effortless. This is a book to savor.

Ember wakes up in a strange land with no memory of how she got there. She comes from a land of constant sunshine to a land of eternal night and magic.

“A trick. All of it was one grand trick.
But carried on the wings of that thought came another, far more terrifying one.
What was real in this world? “

She is found by Ada, who sees her as their savior. Ada is determined to protect her from the evil Crescent Prince Mordecai, who wants to use her to advance his power.

“Her belief that all she had told me was the truth.
In a world of illusions, this was her reality.
But I had seen too many people convinced in facts tailored to their liking to fall into those clutches quite so easily. “

Ada and her friends are working on uniting the worlds by searching for relics from other worlds. They are being pursued by the Crescent Prince who intends on stopping them.

“The truth alway had many faces. I had never accepted only one and discarded the rest simply because they didn’t fit into the way I viewed the world. “

If you like fantasy with a hint of romance, if you like your heroines nuanced, try this book out. I think fans of Cruel Beauty, Caraval, and a Court of a Mist and Fury would enjoy this book as well. I highly recommend it and think it will be a breakaway hit of 2018.

My only complaint is the wait for book two. I need it now!

I received this ARC through Netgalley and the opinions are my own. The quotes come from an unfinished copy.

★★☆☆☆

(2 stars)

Got this book as an ARC off NetGalley for an honest review. Like an odd number of recent reads, I picked this because *kisses fingertips* the cover is fantastic. I am incredibly easy to persuade about a book if I like the cover, and I especially love the illustration on this one. It's fantastic arc and deserves credit, as does the typefacing and font-work!

Anywho, this is a slightly different YA fantasy- that still, very much so- is extremely conventional. It's an indie book with an extremely mainstream storyline, and seems to fight itself over if it wants to tell a typical YA story, or if it wants to make a point about breaking those cliches. While the latter half of the book surprised and pleased me, overall I found the cast not particularly likable, the worldbuilding uninteresting, the storyline plain, and the writing far too overdone.



PLOT
The blurb for this book is pretty hard to parse through, but the essential plotline becomes very clear early on, and is quite simple: Ember is a girl who lands suddenly in a strange new world, with no memory of how she got there. In her world, only men are allowed to use magic via 'objects of power', and it is eternally daylight- here, magic is used through blood, and it is eternally night.

Ember finds she is a prophesied person in this land, and falls in with a rebel and her friends who hope to use Ember to reunite the world- as it has been shattered into three pieces, and only Ember is able to save them. However, in this world there is the Crescent Prince, an immortal tyrant who has also been waiting for Ember to arrive.

Ember has no idea what is going on, but the plot is quite a 'chosen one' storyline. She is reluctant and confused about the role she has fallen into, but has hidden powers she is only learning about, and must figure out who she is. She hangs with Ada, a lesbian (hell yeah!) rebel, Saphique, Ada's ex, and Other Guy, as they try and plot a way to break into the Crescent Prince's palace and steal an ancient relic.

The first real twist is when Ember kills someone, and in doing so finds out she has a hidden, dark energy that is similar to the light energy the Crescent Prince is bathed in- the series is named after this 'shadowfire'.

The second twist is the latter half of the book, in which the rebel's plan goes sideways, and Ember ends up kidnapped by the Crescent Prince himself.

WORLDBUILDING & WRITING
My very first note about this book is that it was 'wow, talk about overwritten prose!' I'm very much turned off by purple prose, and this book has quite a few segments of exactly that, especially in the beginning. For a quite short book, it made reading- and wanting to read- a lot harder.

I suppose in theory the worldbuilding is quite interesting, but the writing is what fails it for me. The world is split into three, with a different magic system in each one- blood magic controls illusions and trickery, time and space are controlled by objects of power, and... no one knows what the third type quite is, beyond 'some sort of voice magic'. There's some good thought into the world of blood-magic we see in the book, such as how people have pins woven into their clothes so that they can constantly be bleeding to power their illusions, or the way a character always has sharpened hairpins 'just in case.'

However, the descriptions of action scenes, and the writing itself, turned me off to what is honestly an interesting idea. Beyond this, we don't actually spend that long with anything magical happening, Ember's world of time/space isn't particularly explored, and we flat-out know nothing of the third world.

Still, there's a number of interesting fantasy and magical concepts, including world-ideas (such as the eternal moonlight of the plane Ember is on now)- it was just also met with boring cliches. Chosen one narratives, a mysterious race known as The Ancients, sexual assault to fuel character development (TWICE!), an angsty murder-prince...

I think with some reworking, a lot of this book could have been improved.

CHARACTERS
The characters were horrendously forgettable, save maybe one.

Ember, our first person narrator, is fairly generic for a new-wave YA fantasy lead. She flits about with her role in the world, she is able to comment on being a pawn but does nothing of note to rectify this, she has dark angry powers that make her think of being a monster, but ultimately is a nice, smart, resourceful, normal girl. She's pretty, she likes books, she falls instantly in love with a boy, et cetera.

The rebel crew is only really around for half the book. There's an admirable amount of effort in trying to get the reader to like Ada, and I liked her for being something different- she's in charge, she likes girls, she determined, she's very powerful. However, like her two friends, I couldn't really place a personality on her, and found myself quite apathetic about her in the later half of the book.

I couldn't tell you anything about her ex-girlfriend, for one. I mean, I'm happy the cast was so women-centric at first, and we had some good lesbians, but they weren't compelling characters otherwise.

Crescent Prince stands out as the most developed and interesting character, though he is also painfully generic in terms of the genre. He's an angsty dark murder prince- I mean, he's literally in charge of the city and still not called a king? That's YA, baby!

However, the book did some nice choices in the second half. Let me explain how this goes: the YA girl in a dark fantasy book always has an edgy royal/powerful/prince love interest, but relatively often, he's there to tempt her, and she ends up with a more generic nice boy. Childhood friend, quite often. She learns that, while the prince is hot, he is also kind of evil, and she must still fight against him... no matter how seductive he is.

This book, surprise! Does not pull that cop out. Crescent Prince, aka MORDECAI (I think only of that dumb movie when I hear that name now) is Ember's love interest, through and through. No cop-outs there (except the fact they don't bone, which was a real disappointment).

Mordecai's character is much more appealing and non-abusive than I'm used to in this archetype, so I appreciate him a bit. I'd say I'm not that into him, but he has some nice dialogue, he has complex motivations and emotions... I do wish it wasn't such insta-love between him and Ember though, but oh well.

CONCLUSION
While the book has glimpses of higher potential, and is willing to break a few norms, it sadly ends up a quick normal 'chosen one' journey of a Very Special Girl and her Hot Angsty Prince Love Interest. It offers very little new on top of this, making it hard to call it particularly special.

With the way the book ended, and the clear arc of what the sequels will be, I have to say I have no interest in reading the rest of the series.

Pay my regards to the cover artist though. They are doing the work of the Heavens.

THIS COVER!!!!! IS AMAZING!!!

This book keep my attention the whole time, although the beginning was paced slow it not affected my reading because I was so entertained with finding where the story was going, and in who I could trust.
I love the characters. Each one of them.
Ember, the protagonist, is so wonderful and despite her young age she was decided.
I’m so excited for the next book and where this journey will take us.

I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is my honest review.

I think that Evenfall leans more towards a 3.5, but I don't think I could justify giving it 4 stars.

One of the strongest points of this book was the writing. I'll admit that at first I wasn't really into it since I felt that the story was progressing too slowly for me and I was kind of confused, but the beautiful writing kept me going and wanting more. We were introduced to some amazing worlds and the cast of characters as absolutely brilliant. The main character, Ember, read like such a relatable person. Well, at least most of time since we are not "The One". Furthermore, the secondary characters didn't feel washed out, but instead read like real people with different personalities and goals.

Even though I found Evenfall entertaining, I did have some issues with it. Firstly, I wish that there just was more. I wish there was more world building and a closer look into the different worlds, their history and the various types of magic. The sequels should definitely focus more on those points.

Also, maybe my biggest problem with this book was the pacing. As mentioned above, the beginning was too slow for my liking, but then the pace picked up, but maybe things moved too fast. At first, nothing spectacular was happening, but then everything happened all at once. Maybe this first book is just a prelude to what comes next and it works more like a foundation for the sequels. But the aspect of this book where things moved too fast was the "romance". Firstly, the love interest wasn't even introduced properly but from what we know, he's not a really good person, which our main character knows but when they meet she just casually falls in love. The insta-love is strong with this one so I wish that their relationship didn't escalate so quickly, but instead let things move further throughout the rest of the books.

Despite the cons, it still ended up being a fun and entertaining fantasy read and honestly, I'm hooked. I also can't believe that I have to wait quite a while for the next book in the series, but I'm definitely exciting.

*ARC from NetGalley for Honest Review*
I Give this Book a 3 out of 5

Book Cover: AWESOME! 10/10 Love It!

Would I read more from this Author? Possibly
Would I read the Next book? Yeah

Ending? It’s a Cliffy and a frustrating one at that.

Let me Just say, cause I NEED to get it out. I find Ada to be very annoying and she was just TOO much, she had way to much time in the book that I almost thought it was hers. She wasn’t Likable (for me).

I’m interested in where things will go with Ember & Mordecai.

The storyline is ok, could need some work but since this is the first book, I completely understand.

I was very bored in the beginning, I for some reason couldn’t absorb what I was reading, till Mordecai showed up.

“I’ll come for you,” I whispered into the night. “When the world is right, I’ll find you again.”


Evenfall was by far the most unexpected read I’ve had this year. The plotline was not what I expected, and somewhat surprisingly, the charceyes themselves were unexpectedly put together.

The story takes place when Ember wakes up to find herself in a completely different universe than her own, with no recollection of how she got there.

The capital of Nysa is enchanting, with its enchanting citizens and storybook town. The strange new land is not all as it seems, when people can change their appearances and surrounings with glamour and illusions.

When she meets Ada, the scavenger on the run, she learns that their universe is hiding a dark secret, and must avoid meeting the mysterious dark king at all costs.

This book was sent to me By NetGalley and in no way reflects my opinions.

I don’t know how I feel about this book. I love the cover. I liked the beginning, it was interesting and I was eager to read more. Then it was just.... blah. I hated the characters, sometimes Ember too. Ada and her mother, her friends,... they were a big no for me, there was definitely no connection between us. Thankfully it got better in the second half of the book. I wasn’t bored, I even highlighted some scenes - I liked the romance, and I liked the main male character, from the beginning I had a feeling that there was more behind his story and that he wasn’t a bad guy at all.

What I didn’t like was the end. Because Ember got together with her “friends” again, and as I said before I didn’t like them.

3 stars.

I received an arc from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I fell in love with Ember's story and loved the way these author's did such a great job immersing me in this world. I also am a fan of forbidden romance and this book definitely fit the bill. I will definitely put the second book on my need to read list.

"The truth always had many faces."

An utterly romantic tale of darkness and light, of half-truths and deadly consequences. Evenfall is a book that captured my interest right from the start and had me holding on until the bitter end. Filled with magic, intrigue, and mystery, this book was a fantastic start to what I’m sure will be an amazing series.

This is a great beginning to what i'm sure will be a very exciting fantasy series.
This book is filled with magic, intrigue and enough mystery to keep you completely hooked.
I really liked a lot of the characters and thought this story to be really well written - can't wait to see what happens next.