Book Review: Finnikin of the Rock By: Melina Marchetta

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Book Description:
Finnikin of the Rock and his guardian, Sir Topher, have not been home to their beloved Lumatere for ten years. Not since the dark days when the royal family was murdered and the kingdom put under a terrible curse. But then Finnikin is summoned to meet Evanjalin, a young woman with an incredible claim: the heir to the throne of Lumatere, Prince Balthazar, is alive.

Evanjalin is determined to return home and she is the only one who can lead them to the heir. As they journey together, Finnikin is affected by her arrogance . . . and her hope. He begins to believe he will see his childhood friend, Prince Balthazar, again. And that their cursed people will be able to enter Lumatere and be reunited with those trapped inside. He even believes he will find his imprisoned father.

But Evanjalin is not what she seems. And the truth will test not only Finnikin's faith in her . . . but in himself.

My Thoughts:

This is a tough book for me, all around the book was well written and the story real and dark.
This book has extremely high ratings on goodreads and I understand why. The characters and their evolution, the description, the twists in the story, and the beautiful ending but, it was an emotional roller-coaster.
The author stated when writing this book, she did it from things she saw on the media that bothered her, such as, loss of faith, identity, community etc. and she did just that. This book is all about loss and the hope required to save.

It took me about 60 pages to really get into it but it is full of depth as it comes to what you really are reading and realizing it in our world today.
Too many of us forget what happens in life when one looses hope and literally looses EVERYTHING. When things like this happen people change and not always for the better. Sometimes such adversities destroy you and/or a whole kingdom.

This book I would NOT recommend to the younger crowd due to STRONG content (not so much description, but due to what is being stated.)

Finnikin-one of the main characters, is intelligent, loyal, and stubborn who lives in the past and forgets to live and more forward in life. He has a destiny which he refuses until he cannot. He is complex with lots of layers which are stripped away when Evanjalin walks into his life.

Evanjalin is clever, very very clever, sarcastic, intelligent, manipulative in a way that if it needs to be done, it needs to be done and is one master of puppets with these characters that don't even realize they are being played. She was my favorite character because it was SHE who carried the hope that brought a kingdom back together through work and sacrifice.

Froi, is a boy you hate. But hate him because he is so evil but at the same time feel utterly sorry for him for how he has become due to the circumstances given to him. The second book deals with just him and I don't think I will read it due to what it's about I just cant...

There are so many other characters that are so worth their time in my review however you would be reading FOREVER and we don't want that so let me just say this, to really understand the depth of this book is hard reading. It effected me reading it. However this is well thought out and well written.

Language: mild

Sexual Content: Heavy (due to many references to rape)

Violence: Heavy (talks about what/how the conquerors conquered this kingdom-not pleasant) 

Drugs/Alcohol: mild

Here is my VLOG on this book: WATCH!
http://youtu.be/xphRXaoUDxc