Becky's View: Unbreakable by Kami Garcia + Giveaway

Unbreakable by Kami Garcia
♦publisher: Little Brown BYR
♦release date: October 1st, 2013
♦hardcover, 320 pages
♦intended audience: Young adult
♦series: Legion, book 1
♦source: from trade

I never believed in ghosts. Until one tried to kill me.

When Kennedy Waters finds her mother dead, her world begins to unravel. She doesn’t know that paranormal forces in a much darker world are the ones pulling the strings. Not until identical twins Jared and Lukas Lockhart break into Kennedy’s room and destroy a dangerous spirit sent to kill her. The brothers reveal that her mother was part of an ancient secret society responsible for protecting the world from a vengeful demon — a society whose five members were all murdered on the same night.

Now Kennedy has to take her mother’s place in the Legion if she wants to uncover the truth and stay alive. Along with new Legion members Priest and Alara, the teens race to find the only weapon that might be able to destroy the demon — battling the deadly spirits he controls every step of the way.

Review: From start to finish, Unbreakable is a shot of adrenaline.  I tore through this one, literally in one dinner break at work and a few hours the next day. While is may not be ground-breakingly original or incredibly deep, I found it so entertaining and just a fun, exciting read.

Kennedy is ripped away from her good and fairly stable life when her mother dies suddenly.  She is about to be uprooted and put into boarding school, when twin brothers Jared and Lukas burst, quite literally, into her life in the middle of the night, heroically saving her from the same fate as her mother and cluing her in that she is a descendant of the Legion, a secret demon-fighting society.  Her mother was the only member of the society who didn't train their child to follow in her footsteps, which leaves Kennedy completely in the dark.  She finds herself a suspected runaway, having to put her trust in four strangers---the other children of the Legion, all of whom also lost their family on the same night as Kennedy. Now they are bound together, using each of their special skills to track down a mysterious demon-killing weapon and fight off the angry spirits that guard each piece.

The action was the star of this story---lots of exciting fights and some really spine-tingling horror moments.  The ghostly encounters were all incredibly creepy and the settings were the perfect backdrop: an old abandoned house, the bottom of a murky well, an orphanage with a sinister history, and a grisly old prison.   

I felt for Kennedy, she and her mother were close so she is battling many emotions; grief, a feeling of being completely alone, and an extreme doubt that the Legion has the right person as she feels so out of place.   I was a little torn on her relationship with the twins---I generally don't mind a love triangle, but hate when they involve two brothers.  However, the twins' relationship proved to be more complicated than that and their conflict about more than who gets the girl, thank goodness.  I did love Priest---I pictured him as a cool little guy with tons of attitude and a steampunk-ish look to him with his goggles and gadgets.  I actually can't remember if that was how he was described, but that was how he took shape in my head.  I also loved the kind of underlying maternal relationship between him and the outwardly bad-ass Alara.  

The ending was...well, the ending made me kind of mad. Made me feel like their whole quest was for nothing. BUT once I reminded myself that this was a series and there will be more to this story, I was okay with it.  It definitely made me wish I had the next book right now. 

Just a fun, fast read and definitely a perfect choice for a Halloween creep-fest!

Find Kami Garcia online: Website  •  Twitter  •  Facebook

 Purchase Unbreakable:  Amazon  •  BookDepository  •  Indiebound

 

Thanks to Little Brown, I have a copy of Unbreakable to give away! 
•US only, no PO Boxes (publisher's rules)
•Must be 13 or older 
•Ends 10/8/13

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