The Bone Season-Samantha Shannon

Book Title: The Bone Season
Author: Samantha Shannon
Version: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781408836422
Published: August 20th, 2013
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Genre: Fantasy, Fiction

I read this book right when I got back from vacation because my good friend, fellow blogger, and author Sidney McEntyre highly recommended it after reading it on the vacation. In fact it turned out that all my friends at work were either just finishing it, in the middle, or just starting it and so I thought that since I was hearing such good things I might as well jump on the bandwagon and read it too. It turned out to be a really good choice. I was taken on a ride starting from the very first pages to the crazy climax and I found myself unable to stop reading or thinking about it the whole time. 

'The Bone Season' is one of those books that I can't really tell you that much about without spoiling things and so I will give you the short synopsis from the very reliable goodreads.com! "It is the year 2059. Several major world cities are under the control of a security force called Scion. Paige Mahoney works in the criminal underworld of Scion London, part of a secret cell known as the Seven Seals. The work she does is unusual: scouting for information by breaking into others’ minds. Paige is a dreamwalker, a rare kind of clairvoyant, and in this world, the voyants commit treason simply by breathing.

But when Paige is captured and arrested, she encounters a power more sinister even than Scion. The voyant prison is a separate city—Oxford, erased from the map two centuries ago and now controlled by a powerful, otherworldly race. These creatures, the Rephaim, value the voyants highly—as soldiers in their army.

Paige is assigned to a Rephaite keeper, Warden, who will be in charge of her care and training. He is her master. Her natural enemy. But if she wants to regain her freedom, Paige will have to learn something of his mind and his own mysterious motives."

I tend to ramble when I really like a book and I didn't want to spoil anything for my readers that might want to read it so instead I will just ramble on about how much I liked it thereby keeping an air of mystery and intrigue about the actual plot. 

This was Samantha Shannon's debut novel and I thought that it was a truly great debut! It was well written with a really great voice that kept me captivated the whole book. Ms. Shannon had a really beautiful way of describing the surroundings, the characters, the emotions all of it that was the perfect blend of poetry and prose. I'm excited to see how she keeps growing as a writer, because I think that we can expect nothing but truly incredible things from her. 

Although the story was entertaining and kept me guessing and wanting more I felt that there were elements that felt familiar. I know that I will be in the minority on this but I felt vibes of 'Hunger Games' in the story. Now this is not a bad thing at all because I really liked the Hunger Games books! And I think that it was a simple thing of debut novel jitters that made Ms. Shannon take the idea of 'The Hunger Games' and shape it into her story. I know this all sounds pretty harsh but I mean no disrespect to Ms. Shannon or 'The Bone Season' but the stories are similar in nature and I tell it like it is. Now this is not to say that I disliked the story at all or that it didn't interest me it was in fact the opposite. I loved the story and it was different enough that I couldn't wait to see what turn it would take next. It is all around a really great story that stayed with me even after it was over. 

The characters were absolutely wonderful, they were depicted fantastically and each one of them were unique and so deliciously imperfect. Paige, the main character, was so well rendered and real that she had me rooting for her the whole time. Even the 'bad guys' were so well done that I truly hated every one of them. Which is exactly what you are supposed to feel towards the bad guys in a book. Samantha Shannon has quite a way with drawing her characters, she is so great at it that each time I went back into the book, I fell in love with and hated the characters each and every time! 

All in all this was a great read, one that kept me up late and kept me fully distracted during lunch breaks. Whenever I opened the book I fell into it in such a way that everything else got blocked out. It enveloped me and became my whole world. That is the mark of a truly excellent book, when it totally takes you over and fills every one of your senses. I tip my tiny hat four times for Ms. Shannon's debut novel 'The Bone Season.' I am really looking forward to the next book in her absolutely exciting series!