Radiant Darkness by Emily Whitman

Book Description:

He smiles. "Hello."

It's a deep voice. I can feel it reverberate in my chest and echo all the way down to my toes.

I know I should leave, but I don't want to. I want to keep my senses like this forever. I'm all eye, all ear, all skin.

Persephone lives in the most gorgeous place in the world. But her mother's a goddess, as overprotective as she is powerful. Paradise has become a trap. Just when Persephone feels there's no chance of escaping the life that's been planned for her, a mysterious stranger arrives. A stranger who promises something more--something dangerous and exciting--something that spurs Persephone to make a daring choice. A choice that could destroy all she's come to love, even the earth itself.

In a land where a singing river can make you forget your very name, Persephone is forced to discover who--and what--she really is.

Christina' BookReview

 What can I say about this? Hmm.....

So its been a couple of days since I finished this and I'm still angry with the book! I had high hopes about this book. The storyline seemed interesting. Who wouldn't find an twist to mythology interesting? Well I did, and I hoped that I wasn't disappointed. I was.

The first line in the book catches your attention quickly:

"Persephone, Daughter of DEMETER, the harvest goddess. Kidnapped and forced to—”
Wrong! In every book of myths, the same; in every book, wrong!"

Because of that and the summary I was excited to get started with this book. And then we continue to read and through the first few chapters I tell myself, well this is just the beginning it will get better. It has to get better, right? Nope. Wrong.

One minute you see the glimmer that it is and then whoosh! back to the lousy writing. That was my problem with this book.

Not the storyline. The writing.

This book had so much potential but fell flat. I felt like this book was written for an 8yr old not teens. It jumps from one sequence of events to another without so much as a line break. Most of the characters come and go, you don't get attached to any of them and just wish that you could. The idea of the Underworld not being such a terrible place was intriguing and I wished that more time was spent on it as well as more time on the vale.

Unfortunately, I believe if this book was given to a more experienced author or the author spent more time on it,this book could have been a top seller. I also believe that it had potential to be a series.

I would recommend this book to those that love the Persephone and Hades story only if they can see past the horrible writing.