Finnikin of the Rock by Melina Marchetta

I'm way behind again. For real. I've read at least five books without posting at all. It's probably because the books that I have been reading have been super good. A lottery of good books have come my way. Goodreads may be my hero. Now if only the Library would get on board with what I want to read so I don't have to buy any books. :) You know something that I find weird? On Amazon the Kindle version of Bitterblue is more than the paperback version. With the cost of shipping the Kindle version would come out to be the more cost effective method, but I have a Prime membership so I wouldn't have to pay the shipping cost. Purchasing Kindle books is something that I rail on about enough, so I won't bore you with another rant.

Since I have another baby I've gone back to the stingy cheap version of myself. Formula, clothes, diapers, and wipes consume nearly all of our extra spending money. Which really means that I haven't been out just buying five or six books at a time. Honestly, it's for the best. Nick probably won't be excited when he has to build another bookshelf for our ever expanding library. The picture that is the background on the blog is of my actual library. Granted, it's a pretty old picture and there are quite a few more books now. Maybe I should consider updating that. The picture really isn't that great anyway. 

Finnikin of the Rock by Melina Marchetta

Fantasy novels have recently become the things I devour. Literally, I eat them. Okay... Maybe I don't. However, I do read them really quickly. With Goodreads suggesting things to me it's hard not to stay in the same genre for a while. No complaints here though, I love me some good Fantasy. 

Finnikin is from Lumatere, a land which has been under a curse for the past ten years. Half the population in exile and half stuck within the city walls. Those on the outside have given up all hope of ever reclaiming their rightful cities and have taken to living in small camps throughout the nations. All seems in despair. Until Finnikin is visited by a messenger that tells him to visit a community of novices far from where he is. Once he reaches the desolate community he meets Evanjalin, and everything changes.

As they journey across the lands Finnikin's hope for a future in Lumatere begins to reignite. He begins to understand that they cannot settle for anything other than the homeland. Evanjalin leads Finnikin on a path that he never expected to become reality. Along the way they begin to rebuild a nation that is more broken than they ever imagined. 

While I didn't find the book to be as good as some others I've read, it certainly fulfilled all of my needs. A strong female lead, a bit of mysticism, and a love that almost won't be. There came a point in the novel though, that bothered me a lot. I can't pinpoint what chapter is was right off hand, but the language of the story randomly changes. It only changes for one chapter, which made it even more strange and abrupt. Basically the whole story is told from Finnikin's side. He is present for nearly every step and even when he isn't it still feels like it's his story he's telling. That one chapter with a change goes from feeling Finnikin to being Froi. A glimpse is given into the Lumaterean Orphan's mind. This would make sense if it somehow came at the end of the book to sort of make it look like he had been telling the story throughout. However the chapter comes in between a bunch of other stuff. It really killed the flow. It was bad enough that I had to stop and reevaluate where I was at. Other than that small hiccup the story was well formed and moved you along without too many dead spots. What I find sometimes happens in these types of stories is gaps in the adventure. Thankfully she used the fact that Finnikin was telling the story to move past the dead spaces where they had to stay in one place for days due to illnesses that were central to the story.

 I'm excited to get onto the next book in the series. I've already got it loaded on my Kindle and ready to go! I'm fighting with myself though. I need to post a couple more blogs before I start another book. Probably won't happen though. I'm only going to post about three of the other books I've read. One of them is by Elizabeth Berg. Remember how I was reading as many of her books as I could before I got bored? Well.. I barely made it through three of them, and haven't posted about the last one. I also read these amazing books by Kristin Cashore (which are the books that suggested Finnikin of the Rock to me!)

I'm going to go read now. Froi of the Exiles by Melina Marchetta. There will be an attempt to sit back down at the computer and post more later. Getting behind is a real pain the the fingers. :) 

Happy Reading!