Review--Fearless by Marianne Curley

Ebony and Nathaneal were in love before they were even born.… Torn apart and kept in different worlds, will they finally reunite in this exquisite conclusion to Hidden and Broken?

Ebony was kept hidden on Earth for sixteen years, unaware that she was an angel. Unaware that her true soulmate, Nathaneal, was searching for her. Now ready to claim her rightful place with him, in a cruel twist of fate Ebony is captured and imprisoned in a version of hell.

Knowing that Nathaneal will come for her, Ebony is determined to fight against the evil that holds her prisoner. As long as she has Nathaneal’s love, Ebony has nothing to fear. Can Nathaneal break through the gates of hell? Will these long-lost lovers finally reunite and fulfil their destiny?

I’ve managed to finish yet another series!! It’s a great feeling of accomplishment I tell you! It’s been wayyy too long since I last read Marianne Curley’s Avena trilogy and I pretty much just dove into Fearless without having any memory of the past two books. Although, I found I wasn’t struggling so much. It almost felt natural just to be back in this world and reading. Granted, I had trouble with remembering the characters, but I quickly caught up to speed with the key points!

So things pick up where they left off…which was slightly problematic for me, but basically Ebony, an angel who has yet to come into her powers or regain her memory from her time as an angel (and yeah things get a little sticky in that area, but naturally I was just rolling with it) has been kidnapped by Prince Luca, the bad guy. Luca is the king of Skade and he intends to make her his queen, and to ensure this he has sealed the gates so that no one can come in or go out. And the lock is sealed for 100 years. But Nathaneal is not going to let that stop him from rescuing his one true love.

Luca is one seriously skeevy guy. Not to mention evil, but he’s pretty much mapped out Ebony’s life for her. And he wants her to bear his children as well, so that essentially, after going through a few hoops, he will rule the world! But Ebony isn’t so easy to break and bend to his will, which I give her mad props for that. But yet, I found myself getting a tad annoyed that she wasn’t fighting back more. It’s more of a personal thing. I have an attitude one could say, lol. And if someone was telling me that he was basically going to force me to have his children in just a few short years…you can bet there would be profanity involve…possibly even violence. I would be more defiant and likely suffer the consequences later. While Ebony does have some bite to her, I just wished she would’ve had just a little bit more edge to it.

In the meantime we have Thane (Nathaneal) working hard to come up with a plan that will save Ebony and bring her home. He gets a magical object that can easily open a hole in the gates, the problem is closing it. The only sure fire way of closing that hole so none of the evils can get out, is basically a human sacrifice. Thane wants to use the magical object as it’s the only way of getting INTO Skade, but he needs to find a different solution to closing said hole.

The climax, the whole battle of good versus evil felt a little rushed as well. It seemed that within a blink of my eyes it was over before it really started. I mean, you expect the winners, obviously, but still to see it all just blip out like that was a little disheartening. Especially since there was still another 75 pages to go! And the majority of those pages were kind of drawn out. The climax has been reached and after a chapter or two of closure, you’d think it be over, but it wasn’t. The goodbyes were kind of getting drawn out, though we did see some more character growth in those last few chapters, I just felt like things should’ve been more rearranged so that there wasn’t so much happening after the big battle. Granted, I do see why none of the other things could happen before said battle, it makes sense. But from a reader standpoint I guess I just thought and felt like the story was done after those closing moments post-battle. Sorry if I’m rambling and not making sense! It sounds better in my head, honestly!

The romance in this one was both brief and touching. Although I’ve forgotten all the reasons why I should love Thane, I couldn’t help but not get as swept away by everything. Granted I did enjoy it, but I guess it’s my whole memory issue and probably why I should’ve re-read the first two books so I could remember why Thane was swoonworthy! LOL! There were other relationship developments too and oddly I was more than happy to get behind those with my little memory! LOL!

However minor my issues were with this book, I did find myself enjoying it a lot! It just reminded me of the magic that is Marianne Curley! She was one of the first time-traveling books I read and though this one doesn’t have that, it still has that same kind of magical touch to it that I fiercely enjoyed from before! Fearless was an extraordinary story, even if I couldn’t remember how I got to this point at the beginning, it was still a most enjoyable read!

 
Overall Rating 4/5 stars