Review: Storm Born by Richelle Mead (Dark Swan #1)

Publisher - Bantam Books
Publication Date - 14th August 2008
Paperback - 512 pages
Genre - Urban Fantasy

Source - Library

Rating - 5 out of 5: It was amazing!

Book Info - Just typical. No love life to speak of for months, then all at once, every horny creature in the Otherworld wants to get in your pants...

Eugenie Markham is a powerful shaman who does a brisk trade banishing spirits and fey who cross into the mortal world. Mercenary, yes, but a girl's got to eat. Her most recent case, however, is enough to ruin her appetite. Hired to find a teenager who has been taken to the Otherworld, Eugenie comes face to face with a startling prophecy - one that uncovers dark secrets about her past and claims that Eugenie's first-born will threaten the future of the world as she knows it.

Now Eugenie is a hot target for every ambitious demon and Otherworldy ne'er-do-well, and the ones who don't want to knock her up want her dead. Eugenie handles a Glock as smoothly as she wields a wand, but she needs some formidable allies for a job like this. She finds them in Dorian, a seductive fairy king with a taste for bondage, and Kiyo, a gorgeous shape-shifter who redefines animal attraction. But with enemies growing bolder and time running out, Eugenie realizes that the greatest danger is yet to come, and it lies in the dark powers that are stirring to life within her....

My Thoughts - The main character, Eugenie Markham, is just great. She is strong, independent and so, so funny. I found myself laughing out loud during many parts of the book as she is brilliant at the witty one-liner. But what I liked most about her was the journey that she went on through the book. She starts off hating the gentry and is incredibly prejudiced against them, after all she has been told constantly by her parents about how evil they are ever since she was a little girl. However, through her interactions with Kiyo; a gorgeous kitsune (shapeshifter) who she feels an incredible attraction towards; and Dorian, Eugenie realises that the gentry are actually not as bad as she had been lead to believe. These men teach her that, although there are some gentry who do deserve to be hated, not all of them behave in such a way. When she realises that she is half-gentry herself, Eugenie has to do a lot of soul searching as she is now part of what she once hated.

I loved the Otherworld that the author created. The book is full of description of this magical world and I found that really interesting to read. I also enjoyed reading about the character of Dorian. He comes across as incredibly easy going and very funny and he doesn’t seem to take much seriously in life. It is from the interactions between Eugenie and Dorian that some of the funniest scenes occur. I would love to see Eugenie and Dorian getting together at some point during the series as there is a huge amount of chemistry between the two of them. Although I liked the character of Kiyo, he just seemed to be too much of a goody goody to be a serious part of Eugenie’s life for too long.

There is a part near the end of  the book that just didn't work for me. I can't really go into any detail about it without giving too much away, but it feels very out of keeping with the rest of the story, I had trouble understanding what was happening and it didn't  really add anything to Eugenie's story. But this is my only complaint about Storm Born and it didn't interfere with my enjoyment of the book.

Summary - I really enjoyed the storyline of the book and it is full of action, humour, romance and magic. It moves along at a fast pace and ended with lots of unanswered questions, making me really want to read the next book in the series. I would definitely recommend this book to any fans of Richelle Mead or urban fantasy.

Other books in the series:
1. Storm Born
2. Thorn Queen
3. Iron Crowned

Other reviews of this book:
Bitten by Books / Book Chick City / Diary of a Bibliophile / Feeling Fictional / Vampire Book Club
(If you would like your review of Storm Born included here, please leave a link to your review in the comments and I will be sure to add it)