The Sweetest Dark

The Sweetest Dark

Shana Abe

ISBN: 978-0-345-53171-1

Release date: April 2013

*This is an uncorrected galley I received via NetGalley*

4 Stars

In 1915 London, orphan Lora Jones, has known true hardship and has learned how to survive the rough environments that she has grown up in.  Being an orphan is tough, but being an orphan who is different and has unique gifts is dangerous.  When she is chosen to attend an elite finishing school for girls as one of the Duke’s charity cases it’s clear that she has a chance at a better life, but she soon has trouble keeping her gifts hidden.  The strange draw towards the Duke’s son, Armand, and her growing feelings for the groundskeeper, Jesse, provides answers that she had thought impossible and bonds the three of them in ways that they never expected or welcomed but that could possibly save their lives.

I like to get the negatives out of the way first. Pacing is my big complaint.  There are a few places here and there that seemed slower that the rest. The lulls didn’t last long, but they were noticeable. The other thing is that I felt the characters lacked some depth. I won’t nag on that too much (that would normally be the big complaint) because in a way it does go along with the story line and could have been intentional. Like I noted above…this is an uncorrected galley so any grammar, spelling, or formatting mistakes were ignored. Plus I am no grammatical genius so I wouldn’t do that unless the mistakes made it unreadable.

The plot in many ways is original (in my reading experience thus far) and that kept my fingers turning the pages. It has mystery, action, adventure, and love so there’s a little bit of something for everyone.  There’s also this beautiful quality to it that made me want to sink into the words and stay cuddled up in them.  The descriptiveness was so vivid that I would get goose pimples every once in awhile and that made up for the complaints that I did have.

This was my first novel by this author but will not be the last. This is a light read and  even with the slow spots here and there it could easily be read in one sitting if someone has that option. I definitely recommend this one.