Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

The concept sounded too good to be true!

This one confused me within the first few chapters, from then on I was fighting a losing battle.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for this review copy of Brotherhood of Shades by Dawn Finch.

Brotherhood of Shades is a young adult fantasy about a secret organization of spirits (called “shades”) who control aspects of the human and supernatural world behind the scenes. The book centers around 14 year old “Adam” and his entry into the group under the tutelage of a Shade named D’Scover. We are supposed to be learning about the Shades along with Adam but I’ll admit I was completely confused by the world and magic building. There is a mix of modern technology along with ancient texts and libraries. The paranormal beings ranged from ghosts to demons to witches and by the end I wasn’t quite sure what the point of any of it was.
I was also disappointed in the portrayal of Adam’s life in adoptive and foster homes and felt like it relied on outdated tropes and stereotypes. I wish the author had put as much research and time in his backstory as she did some of the British history and landmarks.

In the end, I found this to be a very confusing and uninspired paranormal fantasy. I didn’t relate to any of the characters and found their backgrounds sketchy and not fleshed out. I give this a solid 2 stars.

What I need to say first is that due to the formatting on the file provided, this took me a long while to read as it was particularly offputting!

However, it says a lot about the book that despite starts and stops due to that, I was engaged enough to continue until the end! The storyline was brilliantly unique, and so engrossing! I throughly enjoyed every page, the Characters are so varied and engaging! I can’t wait to see what happens in the following books.

A cool concept filled with magic and ghosts, as well as well rounded and developed characters although the information-dump throughout the majority of the book left something to be desired.

I found the book way too informative and confusing. There was a lot being told constantly so much that I found it boring.

This was agonizingly slow. I'm surprised I finished it. The plot promised so much, but gave little. I really wanted to like it because I've wanted a story similar to the synopsis for a long time. Could've been cut down on wordiness and perhaps I would've enjoyed it.

From the chaos of Dissolution rises a secret order, a Brotherhood formed to protect the world of the living from the world of the dead. Adam, a teenage boy living on the streets of London, knows nothing of the fantastic and precarious world that exists just beyond his reality – until he dies, cold and alone, aged 14. After years of rejection, Adam discovers he is important, and the Brotherhood needs him. His recruitment to their Order will take him on an adventure that spans the worlds of both the living and the dead, as he and a living girl battle to solve a prophetic riddle and save the world.

I received this book in exchanged for an honest review through Netgalley. I picked up this book because of there seemed to be a theme of chilling/creepy stories so far this Spring and a book about secret societies, death and ghosts seemed perfect! The title and the beautifully illustrated skull on the cover made me really excited to see what this book is really about.

This book’s setting is a bit harder to nail down than other books I’ve reviewed. The majority of the story does take place in modern day London, but alternates into flashbacks often since many of the characters are dead and “remember” their life from long ago. This was a necessary part of the story, but the frequency of setting and time changes left me confused from time to time. I really enjoyed the technology of the world the author created. Since so much of their magic relies on old texts, I was pleasantly surprised how much modern technology was incorporated into the Brotherhood. That was a unique aspect of this world that really made it stand out to me.

There is a large cast in this book. Before we even meet the main character, Adam, we meet at least three other people who are also essential to the story. I enjoyed the diversity of the characters and the author does a great job of writing fully developed characters. Unfortunately, though, I found the characters difficult to relate to. It was easy to understand who they are and what they want, but I struggled to like the characters in the book. Additionally, Adam and Edie’s voice feels a bit too old for them to be 14, which often distracted me and took me out of the story.


The summary of Brotherhood of Shades promises an action-packed story filled with ghosts, secrets and danger. And while those elements are in this book, it takes a long time to get there. A large portion of the book deals with explaining how the Brotherhood operates and how their technology works. This really slowed down the pacing of the story and made it difficult to trudge through to the action-filled scenes. There were definitely some fast-paced moments, but they were too few and far between to hold my interest.

Brotherhood of Shades is author Dawn Finch’s debut novel. It was published in the UK in 2012 and is now being re-released in the United States. While I struggled with the characters and plot, the setting was excellent and this might be a great book for people looking for a new twist on Supernatural Young Adult novels or people interested in the Dissolution of the Church by Henry VIII. This is the first book in her Shade Trilogy.

This cover is everything is definitely what made me request the book. Full book review to come soon .

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review*

D'Scover is a member of the Brotherhood of Shades, a secret organisation who control and generally keep an eye on the ghosts, spectres and any other creepy goings on in the world. They try to make sure nothing untoward goes on in the human world because of the ghosties, and protect important secrets the Brotherhood have held since it began.

Something starts to happen. There is a lot of strange activity, and D'Scover thinks an ancient prophecy might be coming true. Is it really the prophecy though, and if it is can anyone stop it from happening?

The plot of this book showed real promise; it is original, and has a lot of the things I like in a story - action, humour, a bit of the supernatural. And also the cover is cool as heck! But it just didn't hit the mark for me. I think it was just too slow, there was no real warmth or depth from the characters, and no connection. I'm not sure why, but I was bored of this and struggled to get through it. I wouldn't recommend this book and although I think it's the start of a series, I won't be looking out for any other "Brotherhood" books.

DNF at 20%

I was super excited for this - it sounded like epic adventure. However, try as I might, I can't get into the story and I'm so confused of what's happening here. There's barely any explanation for anything; while the blurb makes it seem like Adam, a 14 year old boy who died, is the main character, this far he's barely been in it. It's been mostly narrated by D'Scover, who's one of the dead guys, and his perspective doesn't really explains things as he already knows how everything works.

I'm also not impressed by the writing style. There's a lot of dialogue, sometimes pages worth of it without anything else, and the dialogue is rather stilted and stiff. There's problems with pacing and this far, it's been really slow. I took a look at other reviews and it seems like there problems doesn't go away, and since I have so hard time focusing on and continuing the story, I decided to DNF it. Brotherhood of Shades simply isn't for me.

I loved the premise of this book, and was excited to read it. However, it took me a good few chapters to get into the story properly.

The characters are well developed, though it takes a while to warm to Toby D'Scover, I warmed to Adam and Edie instantly.

There is a lot of jumping about in time through flash backs, but I enjoy books with more than one timeline. Readers who prefer the action to happen chronologically may find this more difficult to follow. I enjoyed the historical details (and am intrigued to find out more about John Dee!), and loved the alternative reasons for some key events in history.

As the story progressed, I found it hard to put down and am looking forward to finding out where the Brotherhood of Shades will take D'Scover, Adam and Edie next.

Thank you to NetGalley for the advance copy of this book in return for a review.

The synopsis for this book had me instantly pulled in. Secret societies, a dead teenager working on a riddle spanning across time? Yes! Unfortunately, it didn't all live up to my expectations. I wanted more action and more movement. There really was a good bit of history and dialogue without so much character and action.

I received this from Netgalley and Sterling Books in exchange for an honest review.

While the idea of the book held promise when I read the summary, but it ended up being way too wordy for my liking and I just struggled so much with getting into so much so that I basically skimmed a majority of it.

There was an overwhelming amount of information with the first 2/3s of the book but it did lead to a very well written ending filled with excitement.


The characters themselves were well developed and enjoyable to read about with their own unique qualities. I loved Toby’s character as you could sense the age and the weight that has been placed on him for such a young age, in comparison with the street wise, smart alec side of Adam and the innocence of Eden.

Overall, this an enjoyable read and great historical connections wrapped in fantasy but it was just a little too much for me.

I received this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
I ended up giving this book 3.5 stars as I enjoyed the plot and the idea being presented, I just struggled to get completely into the book.
It did feel like there was an overwhelming amount of information with the first 2/3 of the book but it did lead to a very well written ending filled with excitement.
The characters themselves were well developed and enjoyable to read about with their own unique qualities. The prose of the text fitted with the age presented of each character and had their own quips or ways of speaking. I especially enjoyed Toby’s character as you could sense the age and the weight that has been placed on him for such a young age, contrasted with the street wise, smart alec side of Adam and the innocence of Eden.
Overall an enjoyable read and great historical connections wrapped in fantasy just a little a little long winded for my liking.

Brotherhood of Shades is a YA fantasy book by Dawn Finch, for whom this is her debut novel. She has also written a number of non-fiction books on historical sites, and I can see her love of history in Brotherhood of Shades.



Adam is a teenager, who dies at the beginning of the book, but whose shade is important to a secret organisation called The Brotherhood of Shades, whose purpose is to deal with poltergeists and other unhappy spirits.



This is a book that is set in present day, with some trips down memory lane to 1666 for example, where we experience the Great Fire of London.



I don't read many YA books, and so found it to be slow in places and giving a little too much explanation, and I'm not sure if that was due to it being YA or not!



Brotherhood of Shades is to be published on 22nd April this year, and will be available on Amazon and Waterstones to pre-order, and everywhere else you can find books!



I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Stirling Publishing and Stone Cold Fox Press (the publishers) for this book.



Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

I wanted to like this as it sigbded s good but I struggled to finish this, it couldn’t hold my interest and I found the pacing not good at all. It was hard to keep up with and the plot was all over the place. Not for me

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy for an honest opinion

I was unable to finish Brotherhood of Shades, so this is not a full review, but rather a collection of my thoughts.

The premise behind Brotherhood of Shades has potential, but unfortunately I was disappointed by the plot and pacing of the book.

I love nothing better than an adventurous ghost story. Unfortunately, Brotherhood of Shades could not hold my interest enough for me to find that love.

First, the good: I liked the history behind the worldbuilding, and the concept of the Brotherhood. I found the combination of technology and spirits intriguing.

The bad:
Slow pacing. At a third of the way through, I was still struggling to find the plot and had read nothing but exposition.
So many flashbacks and POV shifts to characters whose relevance is questionable. I had a hard time paying attention because of the information overload combined with the lack of plot
I was disappointed by the characters, and had trouble distinguishing them. I was not unable to finish the book because I didn't find either the plot or characters adequately compelling.

*Keep in mind, this is just one reader's opinion. I do not speak for everyone, and you might find your opinion is the complete opposite of mine. The only way to know is if you try it.*

DNF- I did not get into the plot..I tried to read more than once but could not get myself to buy into it. I also did not find the characters compelling.

I thought the premise of this book was really interesting, but it skewed more MG to me then YA. Would recommend this book to younger readers.