Monday, May 17, 2010

Bitten by Kelley Armstrong - Top Reviewer


Stella @ Ex Libris!


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Here is her review:



Grade: 5 stars

Novellus Perfectus!


Amazon appetizer:

Elena, heroine of Kelley Armstrong's impressive debut thriller Bitten, never planned that a casual sexual encounter would transform her into a werewolf. Neither did Clay, her lover and one of the leaders of the exclusive werewolf clique known as the Pack; women do not generally change or survive if they do.

Elena's considerable reservations about her new life come to a head and she walks out on the Pack to return to something like normality, finding herself a boyfriend who turns a blind eye to her occasional disappearances in the middle of the night.

She may have done with the infighting of werewolves, but they have not done with her; her former family call her back when they find themselves under threat from those they have excluded and dominated. Kelley Armstrong is very good on the sheer exhilaration of shape-changing, of running on four feet through forests, suburban greenery and urban back alleys; if there is a weakness here, it is that Elena's relationship with the taciturn, untrustworthy Clay is sometimes a little too conventionally romantic--but the dark poetry of the best of the book overcomes this entirely. --Roz Kaveney
My thoughts: Bitten is the first in the Women of the Otherworld series by Kelley Armstrong. It is narrated by Elena, a beautiful willowy young woman, who happens to be the only existing female werewolf! The story is fast-paced and exciting and Elena's voice is fresh and laugh-out-loud funny in Kelley Armstrong's typical sarcastic, witty way.

I discovered the paranormal, urban mystery universe 2 years ago, and Bitten by Kelley Armstrong was the 3rd book I have read in the genre, and the best one of all. Ever since discovering the Women of the Otherworld series and Kelley Armstrong, this series has been one of my favourite UF novel and Kelley my favourite UF author!

The writing style and quality are amazing, really brilliant! It made me determined to read more from Kelley Armstrong. (And apparently Angelina Jolie after reading the novel and loving it so much has bought the rights to do a movie of Bitten, so the movie is in the works.) What I love about her writing is not only the truly interesting twisting plot, but her quirky, funny dialogues, the dry wit of her characters, they make me laugh out loud, they are not only entertaining but also have so much humanity, that they are believable, real, 3D characters, they leap off the paper.

Not only the writing style is fantastic, but it is funny, bitingly sarcastic at times, and the heroine, Elena, is a great one. It all praises Kelley Armstrong's storytelling qualities that even though the heroine keeps resisting the hero's advances, that she keeps on hating him, being angry with him and not forgiving him for being the one responsible for changing her, she won't even consider or hear him out why he did it, that in spite of all this you don't want to slap Elena and tell her a piece of your mind. No, thanks to Kelley Armstrong's great writing you feel for her frustration and anger. Even though you see and understand why Clay changed her, and your heart goes out to him, at the same time you sympathize with Elena too and completely understand her anger and bitterness. Kelley Armstrong does it all brilliantly.

As Joanne Harris, author of Chocolat (quite a different kind of book, is it not?) has said of this book: "It's clever, quirky, hip, and funny, skating between genres with style and grace. More please!" I can only second that. This book has so many sub-genres, it is quite hard to label it.

Verdict: An amazing debut novel for a fantastic urban fantasy series! A must for any UF fans!
If you like urban mystery or paranormal novels, I would definitely recommend this book and author as they are exceptional!

Plot: 10/10
Characters: 10/10
Ending: 10/10
Writing: 10/10
Cover: 10/10

3 comments:

ParaJunkee said...

Congrats Stella!

Julie@My5monkeys said...

great review and congrats

Unknown said...

Wow! Thanks! :-) I'm still a bit shellshocked, never thought I could be the top reviewer! And especially for Bitten, one of my favourite novels! yay! :-) Thank you!