The Twilight Kingdom

GAME ON!!!!

Overall I loved this series! I can’t wait to read the next ones as well! (NOTE: this review is based on the box set Feyland: The Complete Trilogy) At first I was a little disappointed with the first book – The Dark Realm - because I was expecting a lot more magic and fae stuff. It was still good, just different than how I thought it would be! Which is one reason why I try to not form an opinion of how I expect the book to be before I read it. That being said, I read the book fairly or is that faery, quickly and was surprised at how drawn in I was. I was hooked on the characters & rooting for everything to go their way (the good ones only, of course! Lol), I cried when they did or for them, I found myself smiling & cheering for & with them. I couldn’t wait to see if they would outsmart their opponents or get outsmarted themselves, if there would be any new friendships, would any kisses finally happen, would they get caught, would they be saved, JUST EVERYTHING!!!! I read book 2 – The Bright Court – and book 3 – The Twilight Kingdom – quickly as I was so caught up in it, I didn’t even realize what time it was or how much I had read!! After completing the series I realized how The Dark Realm (book 1) set everything up for the rest of the series. Let’s not forget that the entire premise of these books is based on a VIDEO GAME! As soon as Jennet starts playing on the prototype version of the new Full-D system and clicks on the new game called Feyland, little did she realize that her life would never be the same again. Because the Fey world is dying they need mortals to replenish it & themselves, so the Fey have created a way to access the mortal realm via a very realistic sim style video game. I love to play video games and would jump at the chance to play on systems like the ones depicted in this series. Of course I am not sure that I would want to play Feyland, but still…It is such a creative idea to base a series on! You have such a mix of people of all ages and classes that are both human or mortals as the Fae/Fey would say, and immortals like the Fae/Fey and their Courts of followers. I loved how the YA book became so much more than that! I found that I didn’t even think of it in terms of a YA book, well except for the “clean” part (no sex, etc. lol). Personally, I feel that if I can get that absorbed into a book and NOT pay attention to the genre/class/age group/etc., then that is one great book & series written by an equally great author! I know that some people will and/or do, complain about the teen characters being too whiny, too wishy-washy, all full of ‘teen angst’ with teen ‘issues’ like “oh is he going to kiss me?” or “Does he think I am cool?” etc. but I think that they forget that the characters ARE TEENS!!! I had so many theories throughout this series as to who this person really was, or how that was going to play out, etc. but ya, I was wrong on most accounts! Trust me, I have never been so happy to be wrong! Also tells me just how great the author is because NOTHING is predictable which makes it that much more of an enjoyable read.