Spectacular Seraphina

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman

5 out of 5 gnomes

This is one of those books that will stay with you long after you read it.  It's such an epic book and the world that it builds is infinitely intriguing. This book has catapulted into my top 5 books of the year and is definitely one of the best books I've read since I began blogging about my love of books.

STELLAR WORLD BUILDING √
The kingdom of Goredd and the surrounding areas are described beautifully.  It sounds like a normal Renaissance type world but then you find that dragons in this world can take human form.

CREATIVELY CHARASMATIC CHARACTERS √
Seraphina is a strong character who must hide who she is because the world would not at all understand.  Being different takes a tremendous toll out of her but she does have one love in life, music.  She's a tad bit prickly/grumpy at times but when she plays or sings music everyone stops to listen.

Orma is one heck of an interesting character.  Being a sar (dragon) he doesn't naturally show emotions.  It's great to see his conflict and imagine things from his point of view.

Lucian Kiggs, a royal bastard (literally) makes for a great slow burning love interest.  Also have to say how happy I am that there aren't two guys that the heroine is crazy over.  I love that the connection isn't instant and that they both know that in the end it might not work out for them.  He makes a great counterpoint to Seraphina because he's always looking for the truth.

I really like that there are a lot of shades of grey when it comes to these characters.  At least two characters that I could have swore were going to be bad guys, turned out to be good and rather vital to the story.

I also adore that Seraphina has a love interest but is not putting that above what she has to do.  She knows there are more important things to do first like staying alive and hoping that the kingdom survives.

This is such a great story and explores so many interesting themes.  It’s a story about fitting in that’s just told beautifully and from quite an interesting perspective.  I truly can’t wait to see what happens next in this medieval, magical, dragon filled world.