Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Enter another world in this magical SUNDAY TIMES bestseller
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4.3 • 422 Ratings
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE is a book unbounded by genre but located at a magical crossroads where THE PASSAGE meets PHILIP PULLMAN and TWILIGHT meets PAN'S LABYRINTH.
Errand requiring immediate attention. Come.
The note was on vellum, pierced by the talons of the almost-crow that delivered it. Karou read the message. 'He never says please', she sighed, but she gathered up her things.
When Brimstone called, she always came.
In general, Karou has managed to keep her two lives in balance. On the one hand, she's a seventeen-year-old art student in Prague; on the other, errand-girl to a monstrous creature who is the closest thing she has to family. Raised half in our world, half in 'Elsewhere', she has never understood Brimstone's dark work - buying teeth from hunters and murderers - nor how she came into his keeping. She is a secret even to herself, plagued by the sensation that she isn't whole.
Now the doors to Elsewhere are closing, and Karou must choose between the safety of her human life and the dangers of a war-ravaged world that may hold the answers she has always sought.
'Remarkable and beautifully written . . . The opening volume of a truly original trilogy.' GUARDIAN
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This immersive page-turner is the first part of a trilogy and brings together magic, gripping drama and forbidden love. A teenage art student in Prague, Karou is secretly performing mysterious “errands” for Brimstone, a monster-cum-father figure from another dimension. This double identity leads her into numerous hazardous missions and an equally dangerous romance. A modern and fantastical Romeo and Juliet filled with laugh-out-loud moments, Daughter of Smoke and Bone is also a sensitive and intelligent study of identity and self-fulfilment that isn’t just for teens.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
National Book Award finalist Taylor (Lips Touch: Three Times) again weaves a masterful mix of reality and fantasy with cross-genre appeal. Exquisitely written and beautifully paced, the tale is set in ghostly, romantic Prague, where 17-year-old Karou is an art student except when she is called "home" to do errands for the family of loving, albeit inhuman, creatures who raised her. Mysterious as Karou seems to her friends, her life is equally mysterious to her: How did she come to live with chimaera? Why does paternal Brimstone eternally require teeth especially human ones? And why is she "plagued by the notion that she wasn't whole.... a sensation akin to having forgotten something?" Taylor interlaces cleverly droll depictions of contemporary teenage life with equally believable portrayals of terrifying otherworldly beings. When black handprints begin appearing on doorways throughout the world, Karou is swept into the ancient deadly rivalry between devils and angels and gradually, painfully, acquires her longed-for self-knowledge. The book's final pages seemingly establish the triumph of true love until a horrifying revelation sets the stage for a second book. Ages 15 up.
Customer Reviews
Daughter of Smoke and Bone
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Complete fantasy, of course, but a good read.
Gorgeously written
Beautiful language, perfect pacing, a love story and amazing world building. You’ll struggle to find a better YA fantasy novel.
😍 Excellent
I loved this book, I read it everywhere and couldn’t put it down, if you love children of blood and bone, you’ll like this too. This book had everything: conflict, love, magic, other worlds. And well written too. Amazing!