Thursday, November 6, 2014

Blog Tour: Review, Playlist, & Giveaway: The Last Changeling by Chelsea Pitcher

Title: The Last Changeling
Series: Faerie Revolutions #1
Author: Chelsea Pitcher
Format: Paperback, 360 pages
Release date: November 8th 2014
Publisher: Flux Books

Book Description:

A Kingdom at War . . .

Elora, the young princess of the Dark Faeries, plans to overthrow her tyrannical mother, the Dark Queen, and bring equality to faeriekind. All she has to do is convince her mother’s loathed enemy, the Bright Queen, to join her cause. But the Bright Queen demands an offering first: a human boy who is a “young leader of men.”

A Dark Princess In Disguise . . .

To steal a mortal, Elora must become a mortal—at least, by all appearances. And infiltrating a high school is surprisingly easy. When Elora meets Taylor, the seventeen-year-old who’s plotting to overthrow a ruthless bully, she thinks she’s found her offering . . . until she starts to fall in love.

Buy it here:

Amazon

About the Author:

Chelsea Pitcher is a native of Portland, OR where she received her BA in English Literature. Fascinated by all things literary, she began gobbling up stories as soon as she could read, and especially enjoys delving into the darker places to see if she can draw out some light.
Website | Twitter | Facebook

Playlist:

For my tour stop today, I'm excited to include a playlist of songs that I thought of while I was reading The Last Changeling. They're very different and don't necessarily seem like they belong in the same library, but I have wide tastes. As of now the playlist embed isn't working, but here is my list of songs:

1) Revolution by The Used
2) The Popular Song by Mika ft. Ariana Grande
3) One Day I'll Fly Away by Nicole Kidman
4) Lips Like Morphine by Kill Hannah
5) Dark Lady by Cher
6) Time for Tea by Emilie Autumn
7) Alive by Omnia
8) Broken by Seether ft. Amy Lee
9) It Ends Tonight by All American Rejects
10) I Will Follow You Into the Dark by Death Cab for Cutie
11) Revolution by Jim Sturgess
12) Walk Through the Fire by Sarah Michelle Gellar
13) Goodnight Demonslayer by Voltaire

Review:

★★★ ★

Three and a half stars.

This book left me really torn. It wasn't at all what I thought it was going to be, but in spite of that it was still a book that I enjoyed well enough to read in one sitting.

When I first read the blurb of this story, and saw mention of queens and faeries and courts and revolution, paired with the amazingly beautiful winged cover art, I thought that I would be diving into a fantastical, fairy tale book. This is not that book. It is set almost exclusively in our mortal world, and any history of the faeries and their world are told only through the bedtime stories that the lead female, Elora, tells the male lead, Taylor. I'm a bit disappointed by this lack of faerie world building and setting; it's what I expected to be reading. This goes for the character species/beasts/monsters too. I would have liked more time dedicated to explanations.

Now with that out of the way, once I got used to the contemporary earthly setting (which took a while, admittedly), I found myself enjoying this book for different reasons. Though I was bummed by this lack of fantasy worlds, I did like the continuing theme of Elora telling Taylor her story in snippets as a nightly story. I thought it was cute, and it helped to illustrate how they grew towards one another. The characters overall were something I really enjoyed. I liked Elora's "weirdness". She's not from our world, so when she gets here, she has some learning to do. I appreciated the diversified characters. Gay, non-white, disabled, and bisexual characters all make their appearances. I liked watching how Elora's very presence helped to shape Taylor from a quiet, passive outcast into a stronger character, and by end of the book I was rooting for their romance to work. There was insta-love at the beginning, but Elora does keep him at bay, which I also liked.

Back to the LGBT characters for a moment, Taylor and Elora make friends (and gain bullies) by joining the Gay Straight Alliance. They tackle issues regarding same sex couples at prom and equality and as a member of this community, I was really excited to see these elements being featured in the story. We have a lot more freedoms now than in the past, but getting kicked off the team for being gay or getting unequal treatment by school faculty is very alive and very real in a lot of communities. I did think that this was talked about a bit longer or more in depth than Elora's plot needed but hey, I'm not really about to complain about exposure to this topic. Pitcher also had one of the most accurate quotes about being in the closet that I've ever read, especially in YA fiction:

"People hate you and they haven't even met you. But it's better than the alternative... Because when you're hiding, all you do is hate yourself." page 82

Once acclimated, I liked this mix of fantasy and realism. I think it's an entertaining read that has romance, humor, action, and of course, faeries. If you don't go into this thinking it's as fantastical-set as I did, I think you'll enjoy it more. This is a good read for people who like contemporary fantasy/urban fantasy, romance without sex, and mythical creatures from other worlds. Be warned that there's drinking, drug use, bullying, and gay slurs in this book, but they're there for importance.

Thank you to Flux Books for my copy in exchange for my honest opinions.

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Check out the rest of the tour here!