The Iron King by Julie Kagawa

Life has always been very average for Meghan Chase. She is practically invisible to everyone around her, including her parents. And when people do pay attention, it’s usually the bad stuff they comment on. Meghan’s sixteen birthday is expected to be just another day, she’ll be lucky if she even gets a card. After a humiliating prank, a weird overheard conversation in the nurse’s office, Meghan discovers her brother has been switched with a Faerie changeling. She is thrust into a world of the Nevernever, where goblins, centaurs, Seelie and Unseelie fey, and talking cats run abound. Meghan and her best friend, Robbie, who she discovers is a fey, travel into the world of faeries to find her brother. What they discover could change the tradition-bound Nevernever in a way that could make all the fey disappear. Meghan must make a choice to save the very people who took her brother or loose her newfound friends.

The Good: The Iron King had interesting, fun, unique characters. Meghan, the protagonist was most definitely not a helpless heroine. She was a take charge, don’t-think-before-you-jump kind of girl. And while that put her into sticky situations it was very enjoyable to read. Ash was also a pleasure to read. With his cool composure and stoic emotions he reminded me of Jace from Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments. But Ash had the tendency to smile a bit more than the Shadowhunter :). Kagawa was very good about keeping the pace steadily moving forward and kept you enticed throughout the whole book. Lately, Faeries have really interested me and not just from the YA fiction standpoint. I’ve seen many similarities between the multiple faery books and I’ve been interested in the “non-fiction” aspect. Kagawa brilliantly added her unique spin to these histories and I really enjoyed it.

The Bad: The Iron King had this weird predictability about it. Towards the beginning/middle of the book the plot would go into a certain medium, where it looked like everything was going to work out. Which is strange to happen in the middle of a book. So if you are an avid reader like I am you know that well happy endings don’t happen in the middle of a book. Assuming all of this you know if the book can’t be happy, it has to get chaotic. And therefore when something bad did happen it wasn’t a surprise. Well, what happened was a surprise but the fact that is was happening wasn’t. Hope that wasn’t too confusing. Overall, not a huge deal but it definitely lacked a big shock factor. 

Ugly Updates: The sequel, The Iron Daughter, came out August 1st. Look out for a review in the next couple weeks. The final novel in the trilogy, The Iron Queen, comes out in February 2011. It's covered was just recently released. Find it here. I personally think its gorgeous. Also check out the e-book novella Winter's Passage, a story that explains what happened between The Iron King and The Iron Daughter. Check out Julie Kagawa's website for info on her, fun stuff, and more info on her books. 
(Book links to Amazon)

Rating: A-

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