Breath of Angel by Karyn Henley

Breath of Angel: Angeleon Circle, Book One, written by seasoned author Karyn Henley, is a fantasy tale targeted towards the young adult audience.

Book Synopsis (Taken From the Back of the Book):

When Melaia, a young priestess, witnesses the gruesome murder of a stranger in the temple courtyard, age old legends recited in song suddenly come to life. she discovers wings on the stranger, and the murderer takes the shape of both a hawk and a man.

Melaia finds herself in the middle of a blood feud between two immortal brothers who destroyed the stairway to heaven, stranding angels in the earthly realm. When Melaia becomes a target, she finds refuge with a band of angels attempting to restore the stairway. But, the restoration is impossible without settling an ancient debt---the "breath of angel, blood of man", a payment that involves Melaia's heart, soul, and destiny.

This book started out, within the first few pages, with a murder and then the story stayed pretty fast paced from there. It had lagging moments in the middle that I had to push through before the action picked up again, but that was fairly brief. There were a lot of things I liked about this book, and only a few that I did not. I enjoyed the various types of angels, and the story behind their mission, but I felt a lot of the angel characters were completely bland and could offer little for the progress of their mission. For me, some of the "baddies" disappointed the most because while they were terribly feared in the book, I ended up feeling there wasn't much to fear.

The main characters were well written, however, and I enjoyed the majority of them and reading as their stories unfolded. Melaia, the female protagonist, started out as a naive chantress, one who trusted too easily and was blind to the evils of the world. But, as she was thrown into the darkness of the world around her as she struggled on with her mission, she became a little wiser and a little more interesting, though I found her to be annoyingly headstrong and unable to listen to the infallible advice from others at times. While there is no romance in the series thus far, there seems to be a budding love connection between Melaia and the male protagonist, Trevin, and I'm curious to see how it turns out between them in the next volume.

The story ended in a neat little package type of way, but, it did leave me wanting and anxious for the next book in the series (due in spring 2012) to come out so the mission to restore the Wisdom Tree can continue to be carried out. I fear it may turn out to be predictable in the end, but.....I suppose I will have to wait and see.



4 Stars
I received this book free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group as part of their Blogging for Books program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.