Elena Reviews: Air Awakens {Air Awakens #1} by Elise Kova

 Title: Air Awakens
Author: Elise Kova
Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance
Publication Date: August 2015

A library apprentice, a sorcerer prince, and an unbreakable magic bond...

The Solaris Empire is one conquest away from uniting the continent, and the rare elemental magic sleeping in seventeen-year-old library apprentice Vhalla Yarl could shift the tides of war.

Vhalla has always been taught to fear the Tower of Sorcerers, a mysterious magic society, and has been happy in her quiet world of books. But after she unknowingly saves the life of one of the most powerful sorcerers of them all—the Crown Prince Aldrik—she finds herself enticed into his world.

Now she must decide her future: Embrace her sorcery and leave the life she’s known, or eradicate her magic and remain as she’s always been. And with powerful forces lurking in the shadows, Vhalla’s indecision could cost her more than she ever imagined.

This is more of a 2.5 star read, but I need to somehow justify picking up the sequel sometime in the future. To myself that is...

I want to start by saying that I haven't written a comprehensible review in quite some time, so we'll just roll with it and see if it makes sense.

If I'd read this one years ago, when it first came out and I (and the book world at large, in my opinion) was in a huge Fantasy phase...I'm pretty sure that I would've really enjoyed it. With that being said, Air Awakens lacked many things that would've made it a good, if not enjoyable read. The beginning had lots of potential, until I got through the first half and realized how desperate the author was for the Romance between the main characters to overshadow everything else. The plot itself actually does sound interesting at first glance, girl with rare elemental magic has to decide whether to embrace her newfound abilities and save the world or basically keep on living her boring life with the rest of them common folks. Simple enough, right? No, absolutely not.

This book has all the tropes you would expect from a Fantasy novel published seven years ago, but still...it does not manage to show through as an original storyline. After getting through the first couple of chapters (points for actually having them in the first place, numbered no less!) it kind of dragged on to the point where I was close to just calling it quits, but the ending made up for it and now I'm intrigued, I have to know whether the sequel is as mediocre.

Moving on to the plot development, I seriously had some high hopes going into it and was under the impression that things would start unfolding slowly while I kept on reading, mainly in terms of the political intrigue and the magical system in general, but my wish was not granted. On the contrary, I had to read through awkward exchanges between the main character and the love interest, who actually PUSHED HER OFF A ROOF at the beginning of the book. I mean, what? Vhalla, said main character, was really into the whole damsel in distress trope and she couldn't stop reminding us how common she was and how unbelievable it all seemed to her...The plot also highlighted the huge differences between people of different classes (obviously, what Fantasy book that respects itself doesn't have a caste system where the main heroine is at the bottom, makes her way up because of some magical abilities that apparently no one else has, and falls in love with someone that is at the top of the social ladder and shouldn't even be looking at her, much less falling in love with her), but it fell a bit flat when trying to explain the history behind the ongoing war and how magic worked in the first place.

The book itself was told in third POV, which I've never minded much and it was actually quite accessible when it comes to the writing style. Even though Vhalla was flat as a character and her whole personality after a certain point was basically her "becoming accustomed to speaking with nobility", there was some development at the end which makes me curious to see how things progress in the sequel. I can't say the same for Aldrik, bad boy prince who everyone hates but has allowed our dear, sweet Vhalla a small glimpse into his tortured soul that is so much more than he wants people to think it is. He lost me at the pushing from the roof thing, you know. Now the secondary characters, I did like the Master of the library, as well as Larel and Fritz, but Vhalla's supposed friends that she's known for years did not make the cut. Sareem, who was apparently hitting on her but she never realized until he basically broke into her room and waited for her and then kissed her...Yeah no. Anyway, he freaked out when she entrusted him with her secert, the fact that she has magic and then he was reading books to see how she could get rid of said magic so that they could go away together and live their happily ever after. Don't get me started on Roan, who apparently "let her" have Sareem because she's so in love with him she didn't want to interfere. Ummm b*tch please!

Overall, this was an okay read to start the year with...Wasn't really impressed, would recommend it if you're interested in the Romance aspect set in a Fantasy world without having high expectations for anything else!