Audiobook Review – The Tiger’s Curse (The Tiger Saga, Book 1) by Colleen Houck (5/5 stars)

Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Paranormal
Size: 15 hours and 45 minutes (448 pages)
Publisher: Audible Studios
Release Date: May 4, 2011
ASIN: B004Z4EQY8
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the Tiger Saga
Source: Audiobook from Audible.com
Rating: 5/5 stars

This is the first book in The Tiger Saga. There are currently four books in this series, with a fifth book (The Tiger’s Dream) planned to release in 2015 sometime (although it seems like this book has been pushed back quite a few times). I have had this book forever to read. I was actually surprised at how much I loved this book. The Indian mythology incorporated throughout the story is very cool and something I haven’t read much about before. I also loved the tomb-raider style adventures.

I listened to this on audiobook and the audiobook was very very well done. The narrator does an excellent job with the accents of different characters, adds a lot of emotion to the characters’ voices, and had very distinctive voices for all of the characters. This is definitely a series I can recommend listening to on audiobook if you love audiobooks.

Kelsey is looking for a temporary summer job and finds one at a circus helping to care for the animals there. This is how she meets Ren, a white tiger in the circus who seems lonely. Ren and Kelsey strike up a tiger/human friendship of sorts. Then to Kelsey’s surprise a man shows up to buy Ren and asks if Kelsey would be willing to accompany Ren back to India to a wildlife reserve. This is when things get strange. Kelsey finds out that Ren is really a young man cursed to be a tiger and he needs her help breaking a 300 year old Indian curse.

I was impressed with Kelsey as a character and really enjoyed reading about her. She was so level-headed and took things in stride so easily. She is smart and practical and very mature for her age. I did have a bit of problem with the whole “Oh, sure I’ll fly off to India and go on tomb-raider quest, no problem!” thing. I thought it was a bit improbable especially considering how practical Kelsey is in other areas of her life, but once I got past that I really enjoyed the story.

Ren was a wonderful character and the romance between him and Kelsey is very well done. I will admit I wanted to smack the two of them at points. But they have great chemistry together and are dealing with some very unique relationship issues. I really enjoyed that Kelsey had a great relationship with Ren the tiger, but that is was a lot different from her relationship with Ren the man. That totally makes sense and I love that Kelsey and Ren the man had to have time to get to know and like each other as well.

There is a lot of wonderful tomb-raider style adventure in here which I absolutely loved. The traps and trials that Kelsey and Ren had to go through were very interesting, exciting, and creative (and definitely things I am happy I will never have to do).

I also really loved the Indian mythology woven throughout the story. This is a mythology I don’t know a lot about, so it was very cool to read about it in this book.

Overall I really loved this book to pieces. It’s definitely a well done young adult fantasy, with a number of elements I really enjoyed. I look forward to reading the next book in the series. This is a young adult book I think adults will enjoy too. There is a lot of adventure and mythology and mystery, as well as some romance and fantasy elements. Definitely recommended; I wish I had read this sooner!

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge
– Mount TBR Reading Challenge
– Mythology Reading Challenge
– 2015 Audiobook Challenge