Review : Frostfire by Amanda Hocking

Title: Frostfire

Author: Amanda Hocking

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

Release Date: January 6th, 2015

Goodreads Summary: Bryn Aven is an outcast among the Kanin, the most powerful of the troll tribes. Set apart by her heritage and her past, Bryn is a tracker who's determined to become a respected part of her world. She has just one goal: become a member of the elite King’s Guard to protect the royal family. She's not going to let anything stand in her way, not even a forbidden romance with her boss Ridley Dresden. But all her plans for the future are put on hold when Konstantin– a fallen hero she once loved – begins kidnapping changelings. Bryn is sent in to help stop him, but will she lose her heart in the process?

REVIEW

First of all, this book is supposed to be about trolls. Have you seen the cover? She's gorgeous, that's not the point, but the girl looks human. You want me to give you trolls? Here you are:

Obviously, I couldn't believe it, this trolls things. If it was about faeries, it would have been realistic, but THIS, THIS?!? I'm sorry, Amanda Hocking, but I don't understand. You wanted to be original, but it failed. Moreover, before 25% in this book, we knew nothing about this trolls, except the main character was a tracker, and there were changelings, for some of them. Even after some explanations, I didn't see the point. Really. They could have been any creatures, it makes no difference. I know this is a spin-off series, but there wasn't enough world building for my taste, so I was kinda lost...

This society seems kind of archaic, for example a sixteen years old girl marries a king twice her age. The worst part of this world was the children that were given away to human host families. Okay, but they switched with human babies and they put them in orphanages. Like seriously? It's not even their world, and they allow themselves to mess up with some children's lives? How selfish is that? 

On top of that, trolls are racists. There are several tribes, the Kanin, the Skojare, et caetera. Our main character, Bryn, is half Kanin (her father is the Chancellor, most important person after the King and the Queen) and half Skojare, most people hate her for that. At some point in the book, she says Kanins forgave their parents, but not her. How is it her fault that her parents fell in love?

About her, she was mostly annoying. I liked she was tough and ready to do everything it takes to have a successful career, which is harder because of her origins, but that was all. For example, she was mad at her best friend because she was pregnant and chose to start a family instead of being truly dedicated to her job. Of course every other character told her she was crazy, but still. It was interesting to see the story through her eyes, because instead of discovering the world with someone who didn't know anything about it, she was explaining (but the world-building wasn't great...). Moreover, her job is really interesting.

The other characters were alright but didn't stand out for me... I liked Ember maybe?

The plot was good. Changelings that were hidden in the human world was in danger - well mostly the ones in line for the throne. The first changeling Bryn rescued in the book was in danger and she saw that bad Konstantin (who tried to kill her father in the prologue) was stalking him too, so she ran away with the boy, Linus. After he is reunited with his parents, she has to help him adapt. Then, there is a problem with an other changeling, everyone is on guard. Of course, Ridley and Bryn are the ones that see Konstantin all the time, not the others. And of course, they are the ones to be sent in the Skojare court. It was kind of interesting, but I felt nothing were resolved at the end of the book. The book ended quite abruptly, but it didn't give me the will to continue with this serie...

Still, I had the feeling that the prologue was long and pushed up, an excuse for Konstantin being the bad guy, but in the end, Bryn starts to doubt he was that bad, and we saw the real bad guy. It seems that Konstantin was serving a higher purpose than serving the King and the Queen, I guess that will lead to more developments in the next books, but honestly, I don't care. At all.

The romance was enjoyable (with her boss, Ridley), it wasn't a big part of the story. It wasn't instalove because she knew him her whole life; and it was tension between us through the book, even if it kinda exploded when they kissed each other (before she ran away), but that's all. Sadly, there will probably be a love triangle with Konstantin, who is supposed to be the bad guy but did everything for love (WTF? At least, it was intriguing). 

I'm really disappointed in this book, it seemed interesting at first, but I struggled to read it at first, at least I liked it a little more when we had more world-building. Maybe I should have read the main series with the Trylle, I heard Finn, Ember's brother, was in it, but I checked out the premise of this other series and it doesn't look that good.

Rating : 2/5 stars