Review: Fire & Chasm by Chelsea M. Campbell

Title: Fire & Chasm
Author: Chelsea M. Campbell
Publish Date: May 1st 2015

"Azeril is a ward of the Church, and their most cunning weapon. By day he hides in plain sight as a student, but with his beloved obsidian knife, he also kills wizards. Az has no memory of his life before the Church, until one night, when a wizard recognizes him from his past. The killer in Az never misses his mark, but he can’t destroy the only potential link to his life before this. For the first time, Az has a lead on who he used to be—if only he could escape the watchful eye of the High Priest long enough to investigate.

Azeril discovers that the line between good and evil—the primal forces of the Fire and the Chasm—is as shifting as his own moral compass. And the truth about who he is will put his entire world in danger."


StoryLine: It took me a little bit to get into this book, mostly due to repetitiveness. The narration would establish something, and then the a character would establish it, and then another character would establish it, and then later it would be explained again like it wasn't already established 3 times. And on the novel would go, circling back to the same things again like it's some new thought or revelation. But, if you can forgive that, the storyline was actually pretty interesting. Yeah, at times it was predictable, but even though you know some of what happened or would happen, you still don't know everything, and those little mysteries are what will keep you turning pages.

Characters: The characters were sort of fleshed out, but they just didn't really speak to me. There's a lot of themes of good and evil and redemption here, and I like the path that the characterization took for most of the characters. Azeril is an altar boy, but he also is a wizard killer, and not only that, he enjoys it, enjoys causing pain. Despite that and his mysterious past, he also cares deeply for the girl he loves and his best friend. The girl he likes is strong and loyal, but she randomly has fits of pouting and self pity over the fact that her dad left her, which seemed out of character each time it happened. The best friend was a nice addition for the first part of the story, and I would have like to see more of him. The stranger who knows about his past was a character I was surprised to like. He did bad things in his past, but he seemed to really have changed for the better.

Parting Thoughts: Overall, the plot line was interesting, the characters were ok, and the writing was overly repetitive. I don't regret reading it, but it's not something I'll reread.

3/5 Stars