Today’s reading blog post is about a book that I just couldn’t get enough of. It’s by one of my favorite authors, Kelley Armstrong. (She writes paranormal/urban fantasy with a bit of romance. I say “a bit” chiefly because that’s really not the focus of the stories at all.)
So: the book in question is THE SUMMONING. It’s the first in Kelley’s new YA series, “Darkest Powers.” For those who have read her “Women of the Otherworld” series, this is set in the same universe, and supposedly book 2 has mention of the adult characters, but the two sets of books are not scheduled to overlap at all.
This book is awesome. Just a really good read.
It focuses on a teenage girl and what happens to her on the day she sees her first ghost… “and it sees her back.” From there, the book progresses to how she learns to deal with the fact that she can, indeed, see dead people — and what she does when she learns her new friends also have strange talents.
If you know Kelley’s series at all, you will definitely pick up on hints and clues about the other characters. If not, you are given some clues, but they won’t be as obvious. One way or the other, however, the book is fast paced (once it gets going – it’s a bit slower at the beginning as everything’s introduced) and the twists that Kelley is so good at are still there and enjoyable. If I have a complaint about the book, it’s that it is a series and I don’t get to have the second one now. 
Seriously, though, the ending is definitely a series ending and not a novel ending.* There is an end to the book, but it’s almost as if it’s an Act ending, and not a story ending.
But. That said, I still don’t have any complaints about this book at all. It was fantastic.
~*~
*(Side note… I wonder if that’s a YA novel thing? I just remembered that Rachel Caine’s GLASS HOUSES did the same thing.)
