YA Fantasy/Urban Fantasy

The story starts out with a fatal car accident when Susan, an 82-year-old woman, runs over 15-year-old Hallie with her Hurricane SUV. They both awake at some sort of otherworldly carnival where Hallie accuses the older woman of carelessly running her over. Susan claims her gas pedal stuck and that the accident wasn’t her fault. They manage to persuade “the powers that be” to give them another chance. They are both then sent back to earth to discover the true cause of the accident. The kicker is that they awake in each other’s bodies – 15-year-old Hallie is now in the body of an 82-year-old woman and Susan now has the youthful body of a 15-year-old.

I’ve always enjoyed the body switching trope in which each person views life from the perspective of the other. Movies such as Freaky Friday, Big and 18 Again come to mind. In this book, I enjoyed how the two main characters had to figure out how to live in each other’s bodies and deal with all the challenges that come with it. Up until now, Hallie was a self-obsessed phone-addicted teenager whose primary focus was attracting the attention of the boy she was crushing on. Susan, on the other hand, was dealing with her son who not only treated her as though she were a child but was also intent on placing her in a nursing home. They were two people who couldn’t have been more different.

It’s also worth mentioning that there is also a race against the clock theme — Hallie and Susan must work together to determine the real cause of the accident before time runs out. What I especially enjoyed, is how the two of them became devoted and fierce friends, each looking out for the other and evolved as characters. In this way, the story is a lesson in empathy and selflessness — and what’s it like to walk in someone else’s shoes. I think that putting a teen in a senior’s body is an excellent way of illustrating the challenges that older people face in today’s world and perhaps bring awareness to how senior citizens are treated in our society.

That being said, the character development in this story was phenomenal, as both women learn the importance of respecting and understanding others who are different than themselves. They also discover that there is plenty to learn from each other and both attain a new level of wisdom by walking in the other’s shoes.

Though there was a serious undertone to the story, there were also plenty of hilarious moments, like their interactions with their friends and families. There are plenty of laugh-out-loud mishaps and misadventures as they try to navigate life in their new body, which is of course, what makes body swap stories so much fun.

The only problem I had with the novel was that it wasn’t always easy to picture the correct character during the narrative. For example, Susan refers to Hallie as Susan, even though Hallie looks like Susan. Likewise, Susan’s friends and family refer to Hallie as Susan, and when they are in the presence of each other, Susan refers to Hallie as Susan and Hallie refers to Susan as Hallie. Confused? From time to time, I was too. Because of this, I feel that that body swap trope works much better on the screen than it does in a novel. Though I did get the hang of it as the story progressed, it was a tad confusing and disconcerting initially.

All in all, it was an enjoyable and meaningful read with interesting characters. To be honest, I was expecting more fluff, but there was a delightful substance to this story, and I adore being surprised. Not to mention, the ending is satisfying, and I loved the full-circle nature of the story.

I thought the author did an excellent job of telling the story from each character’s perspective and I really enjoyed the witty banter between Hallie and Susan. The dynamic between the main characters was believable and relevant. Body Swap ended up being a beautifully written, fascinating, insightful, and well-wrought book from two very different perspectives and is well worth the read.

A big thank you to EdelWeiss Plus for providing a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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Rule follows three secretive women: Zofi, Akeylah, and Ren, each of whom harbors a dark, traitorous secret that would no doubt lead to her execution if word ever got out. So when the king of Kolonya summons them to the palace, they each believe that someone has discovered their secret and that their days are numbered.

But King Andros has summoned the girls for an entirely different reason. The king is dying, and his only son has recently been murdered leaving no heir to the throne — except that is, for Zofi, Akeylah and Ren, his three illegitimate daughters that nobody knew about.

The king tells the three women that they will train and work with him in the coming days and that he will choose one of them to be his successor. So now they must compete with one another to prove themselves worthy for the throne of Kolonya, so a rivalry develops between the three half-sisters as only one can be chosen as the heir.

However, there is someone out there who doesn’t want ANY of them to rule — someone who knows each of their secrets and has resorted to blackmail to keep them from the throne. The strange blackmailer has given each of them the same choice: leave Kolonya or their secret will be revealed. So as the danger to the sisters escalates, they begin working together each using her own natural talents to try to stop their blackmailer.

What follows is a fast-paced story of political intrigue, magic, blackmail, deceit, dangerous plots, complicated romances, and an enthralling mystery. I found the characters likable and relatable, with distinct personalities and character voices. I also loved how each woman’s secret built up the storyline and overall, felt that the story is clever, engaging and wildly entertaining.

The only thing that bothered me regarding the story’s plot was the magic system. In this story, the people use a form of magic called The Arts. The Arts consists of blood magic tithing, which provides increased speed, strength, and stamina. To activate the magic, you have to cut yourself to draw blood. I found this magic system a bit disturbing in that one had to resort to self-mutilation to trigger their magic, so there was a good deal of cutting in the book. Now I’m not a fan of cutting, to begin with, but I felt especially uncomfortable by this particular system of magic — or any magic system for that matter which involves self-harm to bring forth power.

Magic system aside, the novel held my attention until the very end and had me on the edge of my seat the entire time. And then came the end and it all went to hell. Or should I say, it didn’t go anywhere. The story ended on a disappointing “cliffhanger” in which there was no resolution to any plot thread. Literally, nothing in the story was resolved. It just fizzled out. In fact, the ending was so abrupt that I felt the author terminated the story in the middle of a chapter. It is my humble opinion that if a novel cannot stand on its own, then the author has failed.

I have no problem with books in a series; in fact, I mainly read series these days. But when a book ends on a ridiculous cliffhanger with no resolution, then it’s an utter failure. After I turned the last page this book, I felt robbed — robbed that I wasted three days reading this novel only to end up with…absolutely nothing. It’s a shame really — I really was enjoying the story right until the end, and it probably would have been a four-star read for me. But given that it is only a half-finished book, the most I can give it is two stars.

Now if you don’t mind cliffhangers, then you may want to give Rule a try as it is quite a gripping story. Unfortunately, the cliffhanger killed it for me, and I won’t be continuing with the series.

A huge thank you to Netgalley for providing a review copy of this book!

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A Little Town Called Sparrow

The story follows our main character, Penny, who lives with her mother on a small island in a town called Sparrow. Now Sparrow could be just like any other little island town except that it has a rather dark history.

Introducing the Swan Sisters

Two centuries ago, the Swan sisters, Marguerite, Aurora, and Hazel were sentenced to death for witchcraft. Instead of being hanged or burned, the sisters’ hands were bound, rocks were tied to their ankles and they were drowned off the shore of the island.

When I first picked up this book, I thought that the sisters were actually witches but as it turns out, they really weren’t. They were all incredibly beautiful and alluring young women, and their only real crime was seducing the men of Sparrow (two of the sisters were especially fond of sex). So basically, what we have here is a vicious case of slut-shaming leading to the murders of three innocent girls.

Two Hundred Years of Revenge

But that was not the last the small town heard of the Swan sisters. As it turns out, every summer the sisters rise from their watery graves and return in order to take revenge on the town that wronged them.

Each of the sisters takes over and inhabits a body of a local girl. Once in human form, the sisters then each drown at least one boy between June 1 until June 21, the summer solstice. During that time, no boys — local or tourists — are safe.

You see, once a Swan sister has her sights on a boy, he is pretty much powerless to resist and will willingly follow the sister into the sea ultimately leading to his death.

Oh, and nobody knows which local girl is possessed because while living in their host’s body, the Swan sister is able to absorb the personality and all the memories and mannerisms of their host, so it’s nearly impossible to tell who has been possessed.

But despite the danger, tourists flock in from all over in the hopes of perhaps catching a glimpse of the infamous Swan sisters who have killed innocent boys every summer in the town for the past 200 years.

There’s a New Boy in Town

So back to our main characters, Penny. So on the eve of the sister’s yearly return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives in Sparrow, utterly oblivious to the dangers he has just walked into.

Now there was kind of an insta-love thing going on with Penny and Bo which annoyed me a bit, but the story was interesting enough that I was able to overlook it, especially when we learn that they both have secrets that they are keeping from each other.

But still, they moved to the lovey-dovey stage really quickly. So they get together romantically but as we can guess, one of the sisters sets her sights on Bo, and it’s up to Penny to protect him.

The Past and the Present

I enjoyed how the story weaved back and forth between present day and the past when the sisters were still human, and it slowly unfolds how things ended up turning so tragic for them and the town. It was nice to see the human side of the Swans and not only the raging, vengeful side, which helped the reader to kind of understand where they were coming from.

Everyone’s a Suspect

The town drama sucked me in as well. Once boys began drowning, mistrust spreads like wildfire as everyone, the reader included, tries to figure out which girls the sisters have possessed.

Everyone is a suspect which means that not only is any boy safe, neither is any girl as the town turns into a literal witch hunt. So the mystery aspect of it was kind of fun. There is also a mystery surrounding Penny’s absent father which gets revealed later on in the story.

I love a story with dark legends, curses, and revenge and in that regard, this book didn’t disappoint. The writing in this book was also quite beautiful and lyrical — almost magical — and the author is obviously quite adept at crafting beautiful prose.

Lack of Chemistry

I already mentioned disliking the insta-love trope, but even apart from that, the romance didn’t really work for me. In my opinion, this was the weakest aspect of the story. I dunno, I didn’t feel the intensity and chemistry between them, certainly not enough that they would risk their lives for each other after having only met a few days earlier.

A Slow Start

I also have to admit that I had a hell of a time getting into this book. Usually, when I start a novel, I finish it in a couple of days. I kept picking this up and putting it back down for several days at a time and even considered DNFing it a time or two.

So there was an incredibly slow buildup to the story, at least for me. The characters perhaps lacked depth initially, they most of them ended up being nicely-developed later on.

But I did feel that there somewhat of a pacing problem in the story and it took a long time to get into it. But once the story picked up steam past the halfway point, my interest peaked as well, and I found myself utterly enjoying it.

An Easy-To-Guess Twist

Another niggle is that I figured out the twist pretty early on. I think maybe it could have been camouflaged a little better and not be so evident and easy to guess. But even though I figured it out, the story was still fun, and I enjoyed seeing it all play out.

And What’s with Those Festivals?

One aspect of the story that struck me as odd was the festivals and celebrations that the town would hold during Swan Season, complete with parties and various festivities. I mean every year during this time, several young men are murdered.

Were people so desensitized to these deaths that celebrating the Swan Sisters seemed okay to them? I can’t believe that people in a small town would act like this. You’d think they’d close off the town, shut down their shops and head for the hills during the month of June rather than engaging in merrymaking.

My Verdict

I liked the premise of this story, and The Wicked Deep ended up being a heavy tale about revenge, murder, betrayal, and forgiveness. In this way, it was a darker story, kind of spooky, and positively heartbreaking in places.

Once I got past the halfway point, I became more invested in what happened to the characters and the story enthralled me much more than it did initially.

But the plodding start and the predictability of the plot kind of dampened my enthusiasm for the book. I didn’t dislike it. On the contrary, I thought that the story was compelling and entertaining with interesting characters, and I am glad that I read it. I just didn’t love it quite as much as I hoped I would. And I ended up giving this 3 stars ⭐ ⭐ ⭐.

You can purchase The Wicked Deep here at Amazon or at The Book Depository.