Morning Star (Ethos) by Desiree Finkbeiner

 When a mysterious stranger interrupts Brianna’s mundane routine, her eyes are opened to the dark underbelly of reality… immortal rogues, ancient conspiracies, prophetic revelations, savage tribes, mammoth dragonflies…

She’s thrust into a race for her life when Kalen, a warrior from Ethos, discovers that she is harboring a secret… a secret that he’d give his life to protect.

There’s just one little problem… they are tempted by a forbidden romance, which threatens to compromise a divinely appointed mission. They are faced with a choice… love eternal, or the end of the world. Book description.

I was given this copy by author free for review, but as always on the basis that my opinion is honestly held, and whether paid for or free my views are not influenced by that. Integrity is important to me and gushing false reviews do neither author nor reader any favours. As always my views are what I honestly feel about this book.

This novel is paranormal romance and aimed at young adult market though will be appreciated by all fantasy romance lovers who like sweet gentle romance rather than graphic explicit sex scenes. Its abased around the often used conundrum of forbidden love. Brianna thinks she's an average teenage American girl until some strange events happen, and she gets caught up in an adventure that sees taken by her protector Kalen to his world. Along the way they fall in love despite it being forbidden, she gets chased by the wicked Ellette, betrayed by those she thought they could trust, and taken far from home to her new destiny.

It’s a beautiful love story, well written and easy to follow. As a young adult novel its not a genre I'd usually read preferring my romances to have a little more “action” but I got caught up in Brianna and Kalens story enough to want to see how it ended. It's got several well developed plots, not relying on just one to carry the book through and each is well expanded and believable – given that fantasy demands suspension of normal beliefs of course. Even so many novels strain credibility too far and end plots with a weak conclusion – not so this one. Each section is well integrated and easy to follow. There's a clear divide between the villains and heroes, plot lines involving fairies, prophecies and everlasting life. Its really a novel full of plots and peoples. The downsides – Kalen is a warrior but to be honest I found him a bit of a wimp and Brianna seemed a bit confused in her thinking and young for her age given the scenario she finds herself in. The two are not allowed to be in love, they fall in love, give love up for the greater good etc. – all excellent potential plots but they seemed very unemotional rather than angst filled. I feel much more could have been made of the emotions in these parts rather than what seemed like “OK Kalen, we can't be in love so we'll just take that bit back” and then carrying in as normal. It didn't feel as if they were making some great sacrifice but rather as if they were choosing what to have for supper.....Surely there'd be tears, emotional teenage angst, grudges – even if it is for good reasons the emotions still come into play but Brianna and Kalen seem to bypass all of that and just easily move on.

 There's plenty to get your teeth into in this book, it’s a very good length at 426 pages for just £1.94 on kindle. Its not just dull filler either but lots of detail except for the constant repetitive comments on how beautiful, amazing, wonderful Kalen is. It reminded me of the constant “sweet breath” Bella keeps on telling us Edward has in Twilight. I'd imagine the target market for both books are similar so maybe young adults don't mind this but as an older person I found it grating. Technically I found very few errors – always good to see when so many kindle books have lots. 

 Stars – 3.5. If it had a little more emotion in what should have been tear filled decisions I'd have gone for 4 stars but just felt that part was lacking.

Reviewed by Midnight Ruby

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