Review: Angelfall

Title: Angelfall
Author: Susan Ee
Series: Penryn and the End of Days
Volume: 1
Genre: Fantasy, Dystopia, Paranormal

Why I Read It: I have had a long standing prejudice against angel books. It isn't for any religious reason- I just dislike angels on principle. I'm not explaining very well. I don't love the glowing, joy-bringing divine being thing- I don't know why. However, I like the idea of scary angels (which is actually more accurate according to the research I've done- angels were kind of into smiting and divine justice and leveling towns for immorality). This one had good reviews and Amazon kept recommending it to me (because Amazon knows me oh so well), so I figured I would give it a go.

A Quick Summary: It has been six weeks since the angels came and started leveling cities. The human world live in fear, and society has disintegrated. Penryn is now struggling to keep her family going- her wheelchair bound eight year old sister and her paranoid schizophrenic mother. When they are out in the streets, they watch an angel having his wings sliced off. When the angels who did the slicing see Penryn and her family they take off with her little sister, leaving Penryn to do whatever she can to get her back. Including allying herself with the now wingless angel in an attempt to retrieve her sister and get his wings sewn back on.

What I Thought: That summary is awful for one thing. I am a terrible summarize-r. That not withstanding, I enjoyed this one. Penryn was an interesting character- she's both very brave and very vulnerable. She's been forced to become a tough survivor, and to provide for her family, and she's risen to that challenge. She's a strong protagonist, but she's also human- she's angry and scared. She'll run, but she won't abandon anyone- she'll stand at a distance and throw rocks (with mixed results). I enjoyed the banter between her and Raffe.  Raffe as a character... well, I'm actually not sure. He's a decent male lead and he's certainly got some problems of his own. The fact that he's an angel makes me a little wary- like I said, minor angel prejudice.

The angels are actually a lot more human, for all of their superiority, than I typically expect angels to be. I mean, for one thing, they're not ten-plus stories tall or glowing, and their wings are corporeal and feathered. The politics going on is interesting... and they're all behaving like children, because, what with running the apocalypse and everything, they still have time to bicker.

All in all, I think this was an enjoyable read, and I'm looking forward to the sequel.

Fun Fact: From what I've heard, angels, in the bible, were frightening. If they were coming to do something non-destructive, they would have to tell the fearful townsfolk not to be afraid, because they were terrifying. (Correct me if I'm wrong, this isn't something I'm very knowledgeable about.)