Title: Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy #1)Author: Anna Banks
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Year published: 2012
How I got this book: Strand Bookstore in NYC
My rating: 4 stars
Goodreads synopsis:
Galen is the prince of the Syrena, sent to land to find a girl he's heard can communicate with fish. Emma is on vacation at the beach. When she runs into Galen - literally, ouch! - booth teens sense a connection. But it will take several encounters, including a deadly one with a shark, for Galen to be convinced of Emma's gifts. Now, if he can only convince Emma that she holds the key to his kingdom.
My thoughts:
This book was so easy to read, I just flew through it. I've wanted to read a book about mermaids for a long time, and I'm so glad that this was the book I picked up.
The mythology in this book was really interesting and though through. Banks created the Syrena in a way that they could actually exist in modern society, and how she explained the myth about Atlantis and how that used to be real city. One thing that annoyed me, though, was the fact that Banks said that Poseidon and Triton were brothers, but they are father and son. I feel like you have to know the mythology you're including in the book to write about it, so mistakes like that doesn't happen.
We read from both Emma's and Galen's perspectives in this books, which I greatly enjoyed. That way we got to learn things about the Syrena that Emma didn't know, and that made it easier to get into the story and to understand the mythology behind it.
I liked Emma a lot, and Rayna as well. Personally, I would be just as angry as Rayna if I were mated (married) to a person against my will and without my knowledge. I did not like Galen or Toraf at all. They had moments were they seemed nice, but at the end of the day they're both jerks. Galen was way too controlling with Emma, and he held back information from her, information that she definitely had the right to know. Just so he could be with her. And then we have Torf, who grew up with Galen and Rayna, and were best friends with them. He knew that Rayna never wanted to mate with anyone, but despite that he started to pursue her and even getting them mated behind her back. I really rooted for Rayna, until she had the sudden change of heart when she saw him kissing Emma, and then she was completely in love with him.
I liked the whole stalker plot, but I wish it was executed differently. From the beginning I suspected that Emma's mother was the stalker, and I usually never understand or suspect things until it's revealed. And when Galen found out that her mother is the lost queen everyone though died years and years ago, I wasn't surprised at all. It came completely out of the blue, without much foreshadowing, but I still knew that it was her mother when he found out that the queen was alive.
Lastly, one thing I could not understand at all is how Emma can talk underwater. I get that she's half Syrena and that they can talk underwater, but they can also breathe underwater. Emma can't breathe underwater and has to hold her breath, but still she managed to have full on conversations whilst doing so. It's common knowledge that you can't speak while holding your breath, because speaking will use up the breath your holding. And therefore you will have no air left, so technically, Emma should have drowned by staying so long underwater whilst talking.
So while I did have some obvious problems with this book, I still enjoyed it a lot. It was fast paced and entertaining, exactly what I excepted. Nothing more, but nothing less. You can't go into this book expecting depth or things like that, because you'll get disappointed. But nevertheless, I'm excited to read the next book, and I'm really hoping that it won't get worse. I have such high hopes for this series, because this can be great.
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