Ohana Reads: Blog Tour: A Shadow Bright and Burning by Jessica Cluess

Hello and welcome to the A Shadow Bright and Burning Blog Tour! Today I have for you a giveaway and a review of the book from myself! I can't wait to introduce you to the world of the Kingdom of Fire!

A Shadow Bright and Burning by Jessica Cluess

Release Date: September 20th, 2016

Read: August 25th-29th, 2016

Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers

Series: Kingdom on Fire, #1

Format: ARC, 416 pages

Source: BEA 2016

Description from GoodReads;

I am Henrietta Howel.

The first female sorcerer in hundreds of years.

The prophesied one.

Or am I?

Henrietta Howel can burst into flames.

Forced to reveal her power to save a friend, she's shocked when instead of being executed, she's invited to train as one of Her Majesty's royal sorcerers.

Thrust into the glamour of Victorian London, Henrietta is declared the chosen one, the girl who will defeat the Ancients, bloodthirsty demons terrorizing humanity. She also meets her fellow sorcerer trainees, handsome young men eager to test her power and her heart. One will challenge her. One will fight for her. One will betray her.

But Henrietta Howel is not the chosen one.

As she plays a dangerous game of deception, she discovers that the sorcerers have their own secrets to protect. With battle looming, what does it mean to not be the one? And how much will she risk to save the city—and the one she loves?

Review:

Some monsters wear human faces.

I won't lie to you, it wasn't until I checked my sister's list of books to pick up at BEA 2016 for her, that I first heard about A Shadow Bright and Burning. I honestly had not idea what the book was even about, until on the last day of the expo when I found a huge pile of leftover ones, when I grabbed one. After that, I was continuously hearing about the book everywhere, from blogger friends, to different anticipated lists everywhere, I knew from there that A Shadow Bright and Burning was going to be something to be excited about.
The weekend I first picked up the book, was a hectic one, but I still managed to get a bunch of reading done. This was mostly do to the amazing beginning of the book. Cluess had you hooked from the very first pages, from those first few pages, you were already on the edge of your seat. In a world where witches are the enemy, you're sort of bound to be on edge most of the time, especially when you are one, right?
Instead of just having your average witch, A Shadow Bright and Burning has a whole lot of different mystically beings, from witches to magicians, to sorcerers. Even the bad guys were a new thing entirely, they were definitely a treat for people who really enjoy witch books, like myself. The descriptions of them all were horrifically disgusting, I loved it. Cluess was definitely not afraid of not holding anything in.
My favourite thing about A Shadow Bright and Burning was that instead of making the main character something amazingly special, like most YA books with prophecies, she wasn't actually the prophesied one. She just happened to be in the wrong place and the wrong time. This new take was something I'd love to see more of.
A Shadow Bright and Burning was one of the best books I've read in a while, it had me hooked from the beginning, and held me captivated throughout the whole way. I adored the book, and can not wait to pre-order it's sequel.

Rating:

Favourite Quote:

"The brighter it burns, the more it devours."

Recommend to People Who Enjoy:

Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Fantasy, Magic, Witches, Wizards, Sorcerers, Magicians, Darkness

Jessica Cluess is a writer, a graduate of Northwestern University, and an unapologetic nerd. After college, she moved to Los Angeles, where she served coffee to the rich and famous while working on her first novel. When she’s not writing books, she’s an instructor at Writopia Lab, helping kids and teens tell their own stories.