Name: The Storyspinner
ISBN: 9781481405669

Becky Wallace

The Keepers, a race of people with magical abilities, are seeking a supposedly-dead princess to place her on the throne and end political turmoil but girls who look like the princess are being murdered and Johanna Von Arlo, forced to work for Lord Rafael DeSilva after her father's suspicious death, is a dead-ringer.

The Storyspinner

Megan During

This book was an even better read the second time!

The Keepers, a race of people with magical abilities, are seeking a supposedly-dead princess to place on the throne to end political turmoil but girls who look like the princess are being murdered and Johanna Von Arlo, forced to work for Lord Rafael DeSilva after her father's suspicious death, is a dead-ringer. Simultaneous eBook.

This ended up being a very good book. I will admit that at first I had a little trouble following all the different story lines and characters but after a few chapters and especially once you have enough background on each of them it starts to make more sense. Although the story was a little bit predictable at the end it was still a very fun and enjoyable read.

MJ Laird

Where do I even start with this?

I liked it. Mostly. I just... Hm.

Okay, so firstly, I'm sorry but everyone was checking out everyone else the entire time and it was pretty annoying. It was also sort of awkward. For example:

"She'd seen true perfection when she'd trained with the acrobats, their bodies thickly muscles in ever imaginable location, but there was something poetic is Rafi's lean form." 

"Pira didn't didn't want to admit it, but she couldn't really blame the barmaids. Everything about Leão's appearance demanded notice.

. . . But the muscles across his chest and shoulders were anything but childish."

"Her dress was tight through the chest and hips, flaring at her thighs. It gave her enough room to move, while still flattering her wasplike waist."

There was a whole lot more but I really don't feel like searching for more of those quotes. Anyway, it was just distracting and at times somewhat unrealistic. Like, when it's in Rafi's POV and he's describing Johanna's outfit and how it fits her. I'm sorry, but I really don't think most guys sit there and think about the way the dress is cut and what it does for her figure. It just came off really weird to me. It wasn't written in the first person though and I do feel like that makes it a little less unbelievable. However, it doesn't make it less creepy.

Speaking of creepy, there's one character who was positively vile. Now, I will admit that he was supposed to be vile and nothing he did was presented in a positive light. But he was still really disturbing and it was sort of creepy to read most of what he said. There was some innuendo in the book and I felt like most of it came from him.

Something that I saw mentioned in another review and also sort of bothered me in the book was the fact the author refers to female breasts as "a smooth scoop of flesh" and at another point, " a soft mound of..."Oh, and there's another thing. The use of ellipsis points. I'll get to that in a moment though. So, I just don't get why she has to say weird things like that. I mean, it's just awkward. It's awkward anyway but then I feel like by saying things like that it makes it a big weird thing and it's rather uncomfortable to read.

Now, the ellipsis. There was a lot of that. I saw a lot of that in the sections where one of the many characters is checking out another character. They'd be going on about their appearance and then get to something about their "scoops of flesh" or some such nonsense and then trail off before it gets too awkward but you know what they mean. It's just creepy and, again, I feel like it just draws unnecessary attention and makes it uncomfortable. 

And then there were comments like this one, "I don't care if he brings a trollop, or a man, or a horse to his bed," and that just... I don't even know. I just feel like that's unnecessary as well.

Multiple characters assume that Rafi and Johanna are in a sexual relationship. For example, her brother Thomas is worried that she's doing things she shouldn't be doing and he's understandably worried for her. He confronts her, though in a slightly awkward fashion, and she tells him that she's not doing anything like that and doesn't even like Rafi in any way. And she doesn't. And he doesn't like her. They just like making silent commentary about the other one's form. But, yeah, they hate each other.(view spoiler)[Aaand then they fall in love. Of course. (hide spoiler)]

Then there was a super awkward kissing scene... I don't think it was inappropriate but it came a little too close to it for my liking, if you know what I mean. And then what really bugged me was that the girl then goes and acts like a jerk towards the guy and basically accuses him of sleeping with every girl he meets. I didn't really feel like she had much basis for that accusation. There was one girl earlier on the book but he seemed to be claiming that he was only trying to get information and didn't really do anything. I don't even know. That was another awkward situation. I mean, nothing happened and you don't even have to read about it much. Basically it was just people assuming things and just... stupid stuff like that.

Anyway, I'm knocking it down one star for all that garbage.

I'm knocking it down another for the language. It was just a d-word and a few made up curses that are basically their versions of taking the Lord's name in vain. They didn't really curse too much but it was enough to loose a star.

Oh and the violence. I forgot to mention that. Yeah. So, (view spoiler)[ the main character is beat up by the love interest who mistook her for a male poacher. He is then punished with a beating which she stops(after admiring his "poetic chest"). The main character's father falls from a tight rope and dies. There are mentions of the King and his infant daughter being killed and hung up outside the castle. Lots of fighting but it's fairly mild. The main characters family is slaughtered and only the littlest boy survives. The love interest's brother is almost dead but he's saved. A group of people come across the dead body of girl who was quite probably raped. I didn't even know that was what happened until I read about it in other reviews and then reread that chapter so I think it was extremely mild and could very easily go unnoticed. There are mentions of a man killing girls by slicing their throats. He admits that he did it and sort of gloats about it. He talks about it and it's a little bit morbid. (hide spoiler)] Um... I think that's about it.

I did actually like it though. I'll probably read the next one. I feel like it's pretty hard to believe that I enjoyed it after reading this review but yeah. It was pretty good.

My favorite character was Dom and he'd better not die in the next one. I will be very upset if he does. My other favorite character was Thomas.

One thing I've noticed is that people seem to be very bothered by the setting. I don't get that. So, I keep seeing reviews where people say that it seems like it's set in Brazil and that bothers them. I don't know why. I thought the setting was really cool. It was unique. Even though there wasn't a whole lot of detail about their surroundings, I thought it was pretty obvious that it was a typical fairytale land. If you don't know what I mean by that, think of something like Narnia or maybe Disney's Sleeping Beauty. Very... Woodland. Not that Narnia is all Woodland. There actually quite a bit of variety but I digress. Anyway, I just feel like most fantasy lands are described that way and that's fine with me but it's cool when a story is in a totally different environment. I thought she did a good job with the world-building. I really did enjoy that aspect of it.

The Storyspinner

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