Mundie Moms

Thursday, April 26, 2018

SKY IN THE DEEP by Adrienne Young / Blog Tour: Book Review #SkyInTheDeep



Welcome to the next stop in the SKY IN THE DEEP blog tour, hosted by Wednesday Books. I am so thrilled to celebrate the recent release of Adrienne's debut. This book is SO good! I absolutely loved it. Before I share my 5 star review with you, here's a bit about the book. 

ABOUT THE BOOK



By: Adrienne Young
Published by: Wednesday Books
Released on: April 24th, 2018
Purchase from: Amazon | B&N
Add it to Goodreads
Rating: 5 Stars - I LOVED IT!
Source: book & e-arc from the publisher in exchange for my honest review

A 2018 Most Anticipated Young Adult book that is part Wonder Woman, part Vikings—and all heart.

OND ELDR. BREATHE FIRE.

Raised to be a warrior, seventeen-year-old Eelyn fights alongside her Aska clansmen in an ancient, rivalry against the Riki clan. Her life is brutal but simple: fight and survive. Until the day she sees the impossible on the battlefield—her brother, fighting with the enemy—the brother she watched die five years ago.

Faced with her brother's betrayal, she must survive the winter in the mountains with the Riki, in a village where every neighbor is an enemy, every battle scar possibly one she delivered. But when the Riki village is raided by a ruthless clan thought to be a legend, Eelyn is even more desperate to get back to her beloved family.

She is given no choice but to trust Fiske, her brother’s friend, who sees her as a threat. They must do the impossible: unite the clans to fight together, or risk being slaughtered one by one. Driven by a love for her clan and her growing love for Fiske, Eelyn must confront her own definition of loyalty and family while daring to put her faith in the people she’s spent her life hating.

MY REVIEW

A stunning debut that is so richly detailed, you feel as though you've become apart of this brutal, beautiful world. It emotionally broke me, and put me back together.  It's an addicting read that you want to re-immerse yourself if after you read it. I absolutely loved it!  

VIKINGS! I can't tell you how long I have waited to read this book. I was hooked the moment I first heard about it. This book far exceeded my exceptions, and what I thought it would be. This debut is more than Vikings, epic battles, a fierce warrior, and clan loyalty. At the heart of this story is love and friendship, and not just the romance kind of love. It's a love of family, love for friends, love of traditions, and the love of your clan. All of which you'd lay your life down for.  

Evelyn is my kind of character. I absolutely loved her. She is a warrior. She's a survivor, a fighter, and a character whom I was surprised at how quickly, and deeply I connected with her. She's such an incredibly strong, fierce and loyal person. Her vulnerable scenes really resonated with me. I felt like I emotionally connected to all she was battling, both emotionally and physically through out this story. I understood what she was going, though I have never experienced what she had. I love the way Young wrote her character. She wasn't an untouchable character. She was a larger than life character who is broken down, and rediscovers who she is, and so much of that makes her this incredibly realistic character. The YA book world needs more characters like her. 

I loved the journey Evelyn goes on, and those she meets. There is so much more to who these other characters are in the story, and I loved getting to know them. They were three dimensional characters who I felt like I connected with on some level. I couldn't help but loving these characters almost as much as I loved Evenly. I loved the emotional connections they had with each other as families, friendships, and battle mates. Even the ones Evelyn wanted to hate, were hard to hate, because you see them as similar to Evelyn's own clan, and can't help but love them. 

Fiske was definitely a character I came to love. What transpires between he and Evelyn is a delicate, deeply rooted line rich in customs, and traditions of two opposing clans. There's a lot of tensions, and learning to trust. Their way of life is brutal. There's also this soft side to them too. I really appreciated the fact that Young stays authentic to the trust issues through out the story. She doesn't rush what doesn't need to be rushed, and instead allows the readers to see the struggles of breaking the stereotype between Evelyn an Fiske's clans, while still having to stay true to their customs. I loved the trust that they learn to have, and what it develops into. The enemies to possibly something more is one of my favorite tropes when it comes to stories like this. 

The fight scenes are awesome. I felt like I was watching Vikings as I was reading this. These scenes are brutal! Young makes you feel like you're right there on the battle field, or trying to protect the village during the raid of an opposing Clan. Young definitely doesn't sugar coat the brutal life as a Viking. There are some things that happen to Evelyn that were even hard to read. I love that Evelyn and some of the girls are just as fierce as the men are, and they're treated equally in that regard. I really liked seeing the transformation from Evelyn's side from seeing the rival Viking clan as enemies, and having this pure hatred for them, to realizing that they're not so different from her own clan. It wasn't an easy thing, and it was so well crafted in this story. 

The world building is absolutely amazing! I loved the world in which this book is set. I felt like I was getting a peak into the past. Not only that, the way Young details everything, from the mountains, to the woods, their villages, and all the places that make up their home, are easy to visualize. At times you feel like you can also smell the smoke coming from a camp fire, or feel the cold against your cheek, or the way the woods smell. I love the way Young wrote this book. It's so beautifully done, and the pacing is perfect! This book is everything I love in a YA book. I'm blown away this is a debut. I look forward to reading many more books from Adrienne Young. 


ABOUT THE AUTHOR


Adrienne Young is a born and bred Texan turned California girl. She is a foodie with a deep love of history and travel and a shameless addiction to coffee. When she’s not writing, you can find her on her yoga mat, scouring antique fairs for old books, sipping wine over long dinners, or disappearing into her favorite art museums. She lives with her documentary filmmaker husband and their four little wildlings beneath the West Coast sun. Website/Twitter/Facebook

1 comment:

  1. Eee, this review is so so awesome :D Gosh, I'm so glad you loved this book Katie. <3 I did too. SO MUCH. And ugh. I need to re-read it. Very very soon.

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