Garkain by Anna J Walner

An intriguing and mysterious entrance that explains just enough to invite us to turn to the next page, and then the next, lifting a smile on our faces as we join the dots, but at the same time, giving us even more mysteries to keep looking for their answers. That’s how you do it and Anna J Walner has done it VERY VERY well.

By the end of the first chapter, we are hit with the stakes: There is something wrong with “The Colony”, and our main character has within her the power to change things. Yet she doesn’t have a clue of what, or who, she really is, and why, and things start to get VERY interesting! A perfect start for a very promising book!

Garkain is about vampires, and although we are not much fans of the long-toothed characters, we actually liked this book immensely due to the great narrative abilities of the author. It’s an amusing, pleasurable and comfy experience to read Garkain as we don’t have to think much, and when we do, we are caught off-guard and out of our depths of expectations here because of the approach that Anna J Walner chose to the plot.

The nuances of the interactions of the characters and how they react to each other reveals  more than the author could have said straight out about them, which adds to the whole experience of reading Garkain. Anna J Walner leaves little details here and there and repeats them in order to make sure that we are at par with the intentions and the plot that starts to get more complex as things advance in a smooth escalating progression as timelines are switched, going from present to past and them from memories to present always with insinuations of the future, which adds to the whole thriller and suspense thing.

Another thing that we did appreciate is the fact that the author didn’t rush in telling the story to us nor in developing the plot or explained the characters at once, which showed skill and control over the writing process and the plot itself, this added trust to us readers on knowing that we were well taken care of and we were facing a neatly written book. This and the non-challans  attitude of narrative increased our relaxation and trust towards the reading session, very well done by Anna J Walner.

The light and dark atmosphere of the writing creates a good contrast of the overall scenarios and set the stage for possible sudden shifts on that come in further in this book. We were smoothly made acquaintance to new environments without even realizing as we progressed with the main character towards her transformations and experiences, and we could understand, with the main character, what were “The Colony”, her abandonment and the “Unbounding” all about, which is SUPER amazing to read.

Anna J Walner has a surprisingly exceptional and non-challans manner of explaining things to the reader through the characters. There’s just NO-FUZZ about it where many other writers would overcomplicate things. It’s something pleasurable, the way the writer makes it all too-easy to read.

We LOVE how the author keeps adding secrets and explaining just enough to keep us going from chapter to chapter. It tests our nerves in a pleasurable way and we want to be up to the challenge, o course, so we stubbornly keep reading and paying attention. AWESOME all the way, and the fact that this book about Vampires, Garkain, doesn’t follow clichés is something EXTREMELY surprising! This is a completely new approach on the vampirism take. We LOVED the small differences and details that Anna J Walner has come up with that literally make all the difference. This book is REFRESHING!

The connection that we as readers get with Amelia is staggering, elevated by the fact that the main character feels normal  although she is special in every aspect. The author made a great job in detailing, reinforcing and repeating her problems with anxiety, sleep, worry, emotional reactions, doubt and yet, stubbornness. The surrounding characters are just as excellently described by the author, with flaws and perks of their own making their personalities vibrant, with depth and realistic in every way.

Talking about realism and how great it is, we have to reinforce the fact that the interactions are fluid and pleasant to an extent that you doubt that a person actually wrote this, and the romance in this story is just blissful. It is very good the read such natural and awkwardly good romantic interactions! There nothing wrong and everything right with the romance in here. Nothing forced, nothing overly sexual, nothing cliché, just… natural and steady. It’s LOVELY. EXCELLENT!

This book is so great that you don’t want it to end, or change. It’s PERFECT, and the end, quite surprising.

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Pros:

• Excellent narrative. Just excellent
• Excellent story, plot, plot development
• Excellent, and quite unexpected plot twist right at the end
• Excellent humour in narrative, with jokes here and there about life and death
• Refreshing take on the whole vampire thing
• PERFECT and exemplary romance, loved it
• Great interaction between characters
• No loose-ends, no plot-holes
• Great and very fluid reading experience, this is bound to be a best-seller

Cons:

• There is that slight “becoming rich for no reason and suddenly having a great financial life” cliché, but it’s literally slight.

Lesson from the book: “Family bonds are deceptive”

Favourite Characters: Ambrose and Roan.

Cover score: 9.5/10

Book score: 8.9/10

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