Young Adult Book Review: Blood and Salt by Kim Liggett
Blood and Salt by Kim Liggett
Series: Blood and Salt #1
Sale Date: September 22, 2015
Young Adult, Paranormal Romance
G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers, 352 pages
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4.5 Stars
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These are the last words Ash Larkin hears before her mother returns to the spiritual commune she escaped long ago. But when Ash follows her to Quivira, Kansas, something sinister and ancient waits among the rustling cornstalks of this village lost to time.
Ash is plagued by memories of her ancestor, Katia, which harken back to the town’s history of unrequited love and murder, alchemy and immortality. Charming traditions soon give way to a string of gruesome deaths, and Ash feels drawn to Dane, a forbidden boy with secrets of his own.
As the community prepares for a ceremony five hundred years in the making, Ash must fight not only to save her mother, but herself—and discover the truth about Quivira before it’s too late. Before she’s all in—blood and salt.
“When you fall in love, you will carve out your heart and throw it into the deepest ocean. You will be all in—blood and salt.”
What happens when you combine the spine-tingling elements of alchemy, a 16th-century curse, and dark magic with lush writing, touches of horror and a sensuous romance - you get an unputdownable story that begs to be read in a single sitting!
To be honest, I have lusted for BLOOD & SALT ever since I gazed upon its brilliant (and chilling) cover and read the summary mentioning that it was a cross between Romeo and Juliet and Children of the Corn. Horror meets romance!
BLOOD AND SALT follows Ash Larkin, a seventeen-year-old girl who just happens to be inked all over with strange alchemical symbols and sees the reoccurring vision of a dead girl hanging in her kitchen. When her mother disappears, Ash discovers her family is intimately linked with a centuries-old curse. Ash, along with her twin brother Rhys, follow their eccentric mother's clues to the isolated settlement of Quivira. Here a secret community is hidden, lost in time, with strange traditions and rituals that will have you glued to the book. How it all ties together is a mystery that kept me intrigued and on edge throughout the story.
I love stories involving forbidden romance and BLOOD AND SALT has one that is 500 years in the making. Surrounded by the ancient traditions that date back to Ash's ancestress Katia, ones that are rumored to involve ritual murder, alchemy, and immortality, Ash questions the strange pull and undeniable attraction she feels towards Dane, a boy that is forbidden to her and the secrets he seems to hold. Kim Liggett's writing is perfect for those who love sensuous, sweeping, and breathlessly romantic reads that are edged by darkness.
BLOOD AND SALT is recommended for readers who enjoy a blend of the occult and romance in their reads, where chilling suspense, horror, and forbidden romance make this debut a page-turning, a wickedly good read!
