DNF Early Review – Kingdom of Souls (Kingdom of Souls, Book 1) by Rena Barron (3/5 stars)

Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 496 pages
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: September 3, 2019
ISBN-13: 978-0062870957
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the Kingdom of Souls trilogy
Source: eGalley from Edelweiss.com
Rating: 3/5 stars

“Born into a family of powerful witchdoctors, Arrah yearns for magic of her own. But each year she fails to call forth her ancestral powers, while her ambitious mother watches with growing disapproval.

There’s only one thing Arrah hasn’t tried, a deadly last resort: trading years of her own life for scraps of magic. Until the Kingdom’s children begin to disappear, and Arrah is desperate to find the culprit.

She uncovers something worse. The long-imprisoned Demon King is stirring. And if he rises, his hunger for souls will bring the world to its knees… unless Arrah pays the price for the magic to stop him.”

This is the first book in The Kingdom of Souls trilogy. I got an eGalley from Edelweiss to review (thanks to HarperTeen for the copy!) This is one of those annoying books that I tried and tried to read. I kept sitting down to read it, getting through a couple pages, and then getting distracted because I just could not get into the story. I got about 30% of the way through before giving it up.

This story follows Arrah. Arrah is a young woman who desperately wants to have her magic power develop (she comes from a line of powerful witches). However, year after year Arrah remains devoid of magic. As signs of demon activity increase in her homeland, she decides on a desperate course of action…she will trade years of her own life for magic in order to combat this evil.

I am having a hard time pinpointing what I didn’t like about this story. I think it was a mix of the slow paced story and Barron’s writing style. The story itself is pretty typical YA, I was looking forward to the witch doctor parts of it and some history around that…unfortunately that was in the story very little.

I don’t have a ton to say about this one. Nothing really grabbed me here. Some of the witch doctor stuff was interesting but it was a very small part of the story. I really struggled at trying to get through this one.

Overall this just was not for me. It was too typical YA fantasy, moved too slow, I couldn’t get into the flow of the writing, and I had a horrible time trying to stay engaged in this one. A lot of people are loving it but I am not one of them.