This new fantasy tale takes the reader on a quest through a supernatural world with unique characters and story that will have you hooked!
Gutierrez’s first novel in The Otherworld Series is just the beginning of an epic quest to take down a ruthless Queen and to liberate supernatural beings from work camps and being drained of their powers. Kyra Staar’s quest takes the reader through a world filled with nymphs, fae, hellhounds, shapeshifters, skelkis, gentries, gargoyles, and relics. Kyra is almost eighteen-years old and starting to gain her magical powers, which will become fully developed when she actually turns eighteen. As her quest evolves, Kyra makes unlikely friends while uncovering family secrets and repressed memories that redefine who she is. As questions are answered, new questions come up. Why did the man who raised her tell her to find an orb that was thought to be lost long ago? What is she supposed to do with it once she finds it? Why can’t she remember everyone from her past? Now Kyra has to figure out who can be trusted and who cannot – and is she able to handle what she is about to find out?
Gutierrez writes in a style that young people may find easy to read. Short, choppy thoughts provide for a fast read, but it did leave me wanting more detailed sentences and statements. At times, I did feel a little lost and had to reread some passages because I could not get a sense of the surroundings and the reason actions or thoughts. I also wanted more description in order to visualize Kyra and her crew as well as the landscape of the world she is traveling through, but that leaves room for more reader imagination and exploration in the second book.
Fantasy books take readers to completely different worlds filled with intricacies and mystical properties that the human world does not have, and I cannot wait for Gutierrez to take me back there to see where Kyra’s quest takes her next.