Monday, November 10, 2014

Review: Talon by Julie Kagawa

From Goodreads: Long ago, dragons were hunted to near extinction by the Order of St. George, a legendary society of dragon slayers. Hiding in human form and growing their numbers in secret, the dragons of Talon have become strong and cunning, and they're positioned to take over the world with humans none the wiser. Ember and Dante Hill are the only sister and brother known to dragonkind. Trained to infiltrate society, Ember wants to live the teen experience and enjoy a summer of freedom before taking her destined place in Talon. But destiny is a matter of perspective, and a rogue dragon will soon challenge everything Ember has been taught. As Ember struggles to accept her future, she and her brother are hunted by the Order of St. George. Soldier Garret Xavier Sebastian has a mission to seek and destroy all dragons, and Talon's newest recruits in particular. But he cannot kill unless he is certain he has found his prey: and nothing is certain about Ember Hill. Faced with Ember's bravery, confidence and all-too-human desires, Garret begins to question everything that the Order has ingrained in him: and what he might be willing to give up to find the truth about dragons.

My Rating: 3 hearts 

Thoughts on the Novel: Not having had much time to read lately and feeling stressed from the massive pile of assignments I have due over the course of this month, I decided to read Julie Kagawa's Talon because it promised dragons and a forbidden romance. Unfortunately, Talon didn’t turn out as I expected because the dragons in the story were generally masquerading as humans. 

Although I originally had no problems with Ember and her brother, Dante, pretending to be humans in order to learn how to blend in, I eventually got bored of reading about Ember surfing, making friends, checking out guys at the beach, and drinking smoothies. You’d barely know Ember was a dragon if it wasn’t for her occasional whiny thought about not being able to fly or her freedom being restricted by Talon.

Speaking of Talon, Kagawa hardly tells you anything about it as an organization other than that it’s bad. The conflict with the Order of St. George is also overly simplified because you’re only told that Talon and the Order have been fighting each other for generations because humans hate dragons. There was just so little worldbuilding in this novel!

The romance was problematic too because there was a love triangle, with Ember being attracted to both Garret, a member of the Order of St. George, and Riley, a rogue dragon. While I don’t particularly care who Ember ends up with, I thought it should have been very obvious to her that Garret wasn’t just an average guy spending his summer on the beach. I also thought that Garret fell quite quickly for Ember, especially considering that he always suspected that she was most likely a dragon.

Talon was released by Harlequin Teen in October 2014. 

Comments About the Cover: It’s simple, but so visually appealing!

7 comments:

  1. DRAGONS? Say wat? I need not read any further, because oh my gosh BUY BUY BUY. I cannot miss out on a dragon/human fantasy, seriously, even if it's horrible I have to try it. It does sound like it needs a lot of improvements though, so we will see :)

    Angel @ Spare Reads

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  2. Huh. I have an arc of this and I was planning to read it later this week, but I have to admit I'm a bit disappointed. I was expecting dragons, REAL dragons, not whiny girls on beaches and love triangles. Oh, Julie, how you have betrayed me!

    *sigh* What can you do? It's Julie Kagawa. I'll read it anyway.

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  3. I was hoping this would be outstanding because Julie Kagawa + dragons is a formula for win, so I'm sorry it wasn't as amazing as you were anticipating going in. Maybe this will be a series that gets better as it goes. I struggled with the first Iron Fey book, but fell completely in love with the second and the rest of the series. *fingers crossed that's the case here too*

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  4. Glad I didn't bother picking this one up. I felt a lot of the same issues with the Immortal Rules series. I'm even afraid of picking up her fey series after reading her other book. I'm beginning to think that this author and I don't get along well.

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  5. I've heard a lot about this book and its lack of actual dragons and action. That's really too bad, I have enjoyed her other books but from your review I don't see myself liking this one. Sounds pretty average.

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  6. sounds very meh. I really liked her Iron Fey books (at least the first three, which is all I read), but I think that was in large part because they were frothy and didn't take themselves too seriously. The problems in Talon you talk about sound like a lot of why I DNF-ed her Immortal Rules series. I think I'll skip Talon for now. Thanks for the review!

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  7. Well! This is a tad bit disappointing to hear. I will still likely give it a try myself sometime... but maybe I'll just lower my insanely high expectations.

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