Book Review: Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor

Book Review: Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor
Rating: ***** (5/5 stars)

“Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love and dared to imagine a new way of living—one without massacres and torn throats and bonfires of the fallen, without revenants or bastard armies or children ripped from their mothers’ arms to take their turn in the killing and dying.  Once, the lovers lay entwined in the moon’s secret temple and dreamed of a world that was a like a jewel-box without a jewel—a paradise waiting for them to find it and fill it with their happiness.

This was not that world.” 

I'm one of the many who thought that this book was so much better than the first one. The story in was mind blowing and Taylor's writing became more and more beautiful (I mean, those prose?) when there's no romantic moments between Akiva and Karou  (not that I'm being offensive), the environment was cool, I can actually smell the sandcastle where the chimaera were staying, the barricades of the angels, the fields in Eretz and its surrounding and everything was so wonderfully described. And of course, the plot, the war.



This book isn't about the timeless love of Karou and Akiva anymore. It was all about their world, the chimaera and serephim and the war between the two. In the first book, Karou was bright, jolly and ridiculously childish but in this book, she was grief stricken, almost hopeless. Akiva, guilt driven primarily about killing Brimstone - who saved Karou's life - and the one who brought the killings of thousands of chimaera was starting to make a move on fulfilling the promise that he and Karou had before - new beginning. Oh, this book was purely war...gruesome scenes, a harsh reality for the creatures of Eretz, hopelessness and will bring you countless anxiety. I might have almost barf on the romance between Karou and Akiva on the first book, but there's no such thing on this book anymore. They have developed individually which is really good and we will see the Akiva (who will not be superficially lovestruck and soft on Karou anymore) who became dedicated on making a new world with peace and also a past about her mother that unlocked something inside him. Karou became fierce and keen on finding justice for the death of her people upon returning to her original life. And there are many events that followed that I really began admiring both of them but I still love Karou more.

Within reading this book, I just can't put it down. The book become so unpredictable and it provided me enough adrenaline and some serious anxiety. There were moments that makes me laugh out loud (thanks for that Zuze) and makes me squirm in my seat. So, I am now a total fan of this series. Now, I will start reading the third book because I am craving for the world of eretz and everything about it. Wonderful, wonderful!