Early Review – Black Five (Black Blood Chronicles, Book 1) by J. Lynn Bailey (3/5 stars)

Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Paranormal
Length: 416 pages
Publisher: Poorhouse Publishing
Release Date: January 4, 2016
ISBN-13: 978-1943468997
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the BLack Blood Chronicles
Source: eGalley from NetGalley.com
Rating: 3/5 stars

I got a copy of this book to review through NetGalley. I was drawn to the beautiful cover and intrigued by the interesting premise. I wanted to love this book but it ended but being very inconsistent throughout. There were parts I really loved and parts I really didn’t enjoy.

Penn has had a rough childhood and she feels like her trials as a child continue to mark her, she also has a secret ability that she hides from those around her. Things have been okay for the last few years but all that stability comes tumbling down when one of the townspeople is killed in a mysterious way. This triggers a number of secrets to come pouring out including the fact that Penn is not human but is a Five and is destined to save the world of Nighmerianotte (a world normally hidden from our own) from the clutches of the evil Vacavious.

I loved the Prologue to the story and our intro to the world of Nighmerianotte; it’s very imaginative and creative. However after that the next quarter of the book is incredibly hard to get through. It was boring and full of lots of high school angst (it takes place in our current world). I didn’t really enjoy the characters much and there were too many characters introduced too quickly.

As the book continued into its second half it improved. I enjoyed Penn as she trained and learned about her status as the Black Five. Some of this was intriguing and well done. I love that Penn actually had to train for a prolonged period to get good at using her abilities (in too many urban fantasy stories this is glossed over).

There were also a number of things I did not enjoy. I hated the somewhat creepy love triangle that was going on in this story…the whole thing just felt a bit weird and yucky. I thought the pacing was sloppy and at times made the story hard to engage with.

I also thought the ending was absolutely awful; I can’t even begin to tell you what happened in the Epilogue of this book…I didn’t understand it. I reread the last chapter and Epilogue three times and still feel like there were some chapters missing or something. There is a large leap in time from the last chapter to the epilogue and none of it makes any sense.

Overall this story was a mixed bag. Some of it is pretty cool and some of it is awful; just a very inconsistent story. I feel like maybe this is a potential diamond in the rough? With some editing and pacing improvements it could be a good story, but as is it is just inconsistent. I feel like there are some neat things going on here but I just couldn’t quite get to them. Anyway, I don’t plan on reading any more of this series.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge