Sunday Book Review

This month's book review has been a long time coming...A LONG TIME.
H.L. Burke is an author that honestly, I wish I was more like.
It seems that she is a writing MACHINE.
I swear every time I turn around she is releasing a new book. It feels like she does one every few months. Which is fantastic, and honestly, one of the Indie Authors I aspire to be like.

And yet, for all of my fangirling, I had never read one of her books. *gasp*

So for this month I decided to finally read one. Granted, I did win the copy of this book through a contest. I think it was a "caption this" Facebook contest. But it was random, and I went into reading this with quite low expectations as the last two Indie books (by different authors) I had to stop reading and put down.


So without further ado, I bring you Coiled!

Book Blurb from Amazon:

A healing touch. A hideous face. A looming curse.

As the ugly twin to a perfect sister, Princess Laidra lives her life in the shadows—until her parents offer her as bait for a giant serpent.

Her escape attempt leaves her shipwrecked on a secluded island with only one inhabitant: Prince Calen, who lives under a curse. If anyone looks upon him, he turns into a giant serpent. Speaking to him in the darkness, Laidra sees past the monster to Calen’s lonely soul, and she determines to free him from the magic’s hold.

But if Laidra can’t break the curse in time, Calen will become a mindless creature of scales and fangs forever.

A YA mythology/romance that retells the myth of Eros and Psyche with adventure, magic, and true love.

 

 

To be honest, I knew at one point that this was a type of retelling, but it didn't dawn on me until a little ways into the book. I am a huge mythology fan, pretty much any mythology but far east (no idea why) intrigues me. I have done plenty of self imposed research into the topics, and completely loved how Burke took the Greek pantheon and made it her own.

From the get go, I liked the characters of Laidra and Calen. Each were likeable, dare I say loveable, in their views and attitudes. Burke used excellent descriptions of them, you really felt with Laidra her curse. How it impacted—and didn't—her worldview. The same goes for Calen.

At one point in the book I thought, here it is "the end"! They've figured this out, they're going to solve the problem and live happily ever after. With these two, you definitely crave that ending! Then I looked down at the percentage left on my iPad...I had 30 percent left in the book! What was going to happen? Then it did, and while I knew roughly how it was going to work out, I was still pleasantly surprised how Burke wrapped everything up.

Because this is a retelling I felt there was a certain predictability to it, but despite that everything was fresh and new. Definitely a perfect example of the old adage that every tale has already been told, but not by you.

Bottom Line?
Highly Recommend! 5 stars!

Coiled on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Coiled-H-L-Burke-ebook/dp/B0713VTDB3/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1518313469&sr=8-1&keywords=coiled

H.L Burke Author page on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/H.-L.-Burke/e/B00EYQ1HLW/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1

H.L Burke. Website: http://www.hlburkeauthor.com/