Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Title:               Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Author:           Laini Taylor
ISBN:              9781444722635
Publisher:       Hodder & Stoughton
Published:      2011
Age Group:    Young Adult


Synopsis:

Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages--not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers--beautiful, haunted Akiva--fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

My Thoughts:

This book should have come with a warning, some thing along the lines of... NOT SUITABLE FOR LUNCH BREAK READING!  I like to read on my lunch breaks and I literally had to claw my way out of the pages to return to work. It really is that good!

Laini Taylor is not just a writer, she is indeed a story teller. She weaves a world so wonderfully atmospheric that you actually do believe you are standing on a bridge in Prague with an angel. The descriptions are outstanding and the characters are very well written.


Overall it was a well paced novel which was very hard to put down, full of mystery and passion. Easily the best book I have read this year, it has left me eagerly awaiting to find out what happens next.