Title: The Bone Season (The Bone Season #1)
by Samantha ShannonPublishing Info: August 20, 2013 by Bloomsbury Publishing
Source: Purchased
Genres: Adult, Paranormal, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Dystopian
Date Completed: December 1, 2018
Find it on the web: Buy from Amazon // Goodreads
The year is 2059. Nineteen-year-old Paige Mahoney is working in the criminal underworld of Scion London, based at Seven Dials, employed by a man named Jaxon Hall. Her job: to scout for information by breaking into people's minds. For Paige is a dreamwalker, a clairvoyant - and, in the world of Scion, she commits treason simply by breathing.
It is raining the day her life changes for ever. Attacked, drugged and kidnapped, Paige is transported to Oxford – a city kept secret for two hundred years, controlled by a powerful, otherworldly race. Paige is assigned to Warden, a Rephaite with mysterious motives. He is her master. Her trainer. Her natural enemy. But if Paige wants to regain her freedom she must allow herself to be nurtured in this prison where she is meant to die.
The Bone Season introduces a compelling heroine into the world of fiction. It also introduces Samantha Shannon, an extraordinary young writer with huge ambition and a teeming imagination, who has created a bold new reality in this riveting debut.
THE BONE SEASON is an incredibly interesting book and it’s also very complicated. I had first started to read this via audio a few years ago and the audiobook narrator was just sooooo boring that I ended up returning it and I never came back to continue on until now. I’m definitely glad that I read this one and Samantha Shannon sure packed in a whole lot of new and exciting information!
The world-building was incredibly interesting and EXTREMELY detailed. So much so that it was a little hard to sort everything out in my head, even with a full chart in the front of all of the abilities. There were just a lot of new names with seven different abilities PLUS the whole concept of being a voyant in the first place and what the aether meant, and then all of the subcategories on top of it, and THEN being in a future world set in London with a whole SECRET world and another race of beings AND monsters. Whew. It’s a lot. It was all so, so interesting but it was just a looooot of information so my biggest hang-up while reading the book was that I just couldn’t dang remember it all. I had to get a grip on all of these new things and top that off with the fact that I wasn’t expecting the book to take place where it did and take the direction it did, so it was just a lot for my brain to try to understand. Good, but complicated.
I… didn’t love the romance. I saw it coming, was hoping it wouldn’t be the case, and that was still the case anyway. I just don’t get the romance trope, which is apparently a thing, where the guy is an immortal who falls in love with a teenage or young girl. Ummm, why? I get that the girl is always the special thing but still. Someone who’s hundreds of years old being attracted to a young girl and vice versa… that’s not sexy. I actually DID like Warden and he has that mysterious appeal buuuuut. It’s not sexy to be a million years old (dramatic, but you know). =
This book didn’t leave me with a WOW feeling but I really do want to see where it’s going and what happens next. I was kind of hoping for more things to unfold in THE BONE SEASON, to be honest. There’s a lot of set-up and it’s enjoyable and I like Paige, but also I think more reveals could have happened here to pull the reader in more and get some more of that wow factor. I guess it probably also doesn’t help that I read this book coming off a Mistborn re-read where things are just so well-structured and I love how those reveals are timed.
I definitely want to continue on in this series and I do have a pull to it. I wish more had happened to connect me in a few more ways, but it was still an enjoyable read and I never felt bored or like there was a lull. Things were still always happening even if it wasn’t quite what I was looking for.
Kept Me Hooked On: Separate fantasy worlds. This wasn’t quite a portal world but it was a similar-type feel! There was a significant separation between reality and fantasy (with a little bit of overlap) and it was interesting!
Left Me Wanting More: Separation. I wish the fantasy part had been saved for a second book, or on the contrary, I wish it had been introduced more gradually. It was just a bit too abrupt for me to go from mostly reality to full-on fantasy.
Addiction Rating
Try it
It’s a really fun concept and I actually liked the character chemistry and relationships! I would say after spending time away from the book, I’m still not sure I really feel drawn to read the sequel, though.
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