Title: Nightshade
Author: Andrea Creamer
Release Date: October 19th, 2010
Calla Tor has always known her destiny: After graduating from the Mountain School, she’ll be the mate of sexy alpha wolf Ren Laroche and fight with him, side by side, ruling their pack and guarding sacred sites for the Keepers. But when she violates her masters’ laws by saving a beautiful human boy out for a hike, Calla begins to question her fate, her existence, and the very essence of the world she has known. By following her heart, she might lose everything–including her own life. Is forbidden love worth the ultimate sacrifice?
Summary from Goodreads.com
My Review: I am sure you have noticed that this book has been getting a lot of attention in the book world. So much so in fact I was a little nervous about reading it fearing it would not live up to the hype. Now that I have finished reading it I can say undoubtedly that this book definitely lives up to the hype! It was awesome! Before I get into the story aspects though, I wanted to mention the physical appearance of the book. Well, first the cover is gorgeous, but I also loved the way the chapters were separated. I have put a picture below to illustrate:
The different phases of the moon are constant throughout the book. It slowly gets bigger as the story reaches climax and then grows smaller again as the book starts to come to a close. That is just genius in my opinion, it adds character to the book. There are also little triangles in the corners at the start of each chapter that seem to change too. What is that about? Anyone figured it out? I know there is mention of triangles in the story as pieces to the mystery, but I am not sure if I am being crazy and reading too much into this or if the triangles mean anything. Thoughts anyone?
I loved Calla, she was strong, non-swoony, and fought for what she believed it. She was a great main character and was easy to fall in step with her. She also has two very strong love interests in the story, and I have to say I can see that they both have a piece of Calla’s heart. If the two of them could just mush together and become one person it would be easy for Calla. But of course that is ridiculous, so she is left with an extremely hard choice. I think it is almost like she has to choose the life that she wants. She is given a lot of information in this book and she has a choice, believe what she has been told her whole life, or dig a little deeper and search for the truth.
I personally have already made my choice and I am Team Shay! Sorry Ren, you seem like a nice enough guy, and I think you might actually care about Calla, but there is something about you I do not trust. Plus, Shay is so genuine and in the whole book he is only looking out for Calla’s well being so he won some big points in my book.
Whichever side you may fall on after you read the book, I think Andrea has done an amazing job of creating a completely new world that will force you to pay attention and fall in love with it. I know I did! The only thing I am sad about is that I have to wait until next year to read the next book.
FTC: I received this ARC from the publisher at BEA.
I can’t wait to read this. I’d probably be Team Shay but mainly because I’d be picturing that hunky guy who plays him in the little web series promoting the book. But we’ll see how it goes once I read it. That’s so cool about the artistic choices within the book- I noticed them while I was flipping through the book. Anyway, great review!!