Review: The Bone Season

The Vitals

The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon
Release Date: 20 August 2013
Page Count: 466
Genre: Fantasy/Science Fiction
Target Audience: YA
Series: The Bone Season #1
Source and Format: Purchased; Kindle e-Book

Summary (From Goodreads)
It is the year 2059. Several major world cities are under the control of a security force called Scion. Paige Mahoney works in the criminal underworld of Scion London, part of a secret cell known as the Seven Seals. The work she does is unusual: scouting for information by breaking into others’ minds. Paige is a dreamwalker, a rare kind of clairvoyant, and in this world, the voyants commit treason simply by breathing.

But when Paige is captured and arrested, she encounters a power more sinister even than Scion. The voyant prison is a separate city—Oxford, erased from the map two centuries ago and now controlled by a powerful, otherworldly race. These creatures, the Rephaim, value the voyants highly—as soldiers in their army.

Paige is assigned to a Rephaite keeper, Warden, who will be in charge of her care and training. He is her master. Her natural enemy. But if she wants to regain her freedom, Paige will have to learn something of his mind and his own mysterious motives.

Notes on The Bone Season
I started this novel with very little understanding of what it was about. I was initially drawn to the cover and the title; both are my favorite part about the book. It was on sale Chrismas day (thank you, Amazon, for those wonderful deals you offered Christmas day!) so I was able to buy it for a song. I am very glad I did not pay full price. I really enjoyed the setting of the novel- future England- and the secondary characters were enjoyable. I found I connected better with them than the heroine. The premise of the story was very confusing and I still do not feel that I have a grasp of exactly what the dnager is. I found that I really like Warden, which surprised me. I would have liked to see more from him. The ending with the flower (I won't say more because I don't want to spoil it for anyone) was too contrived for me. Maybe she will address it in a later book, but I felt Warden was way too smart to have let that happen at such a crucial time.

Chief Complaint
All of the slang used in the book! I am told there is a glossary in the front of the hard copies, but since I had the e-Book I did not stumble across the glossary until close to the end. I am not great at a lot of things in life, but one thing I am good at is reading. I understand context clues, allusions, metaphors, etc. This book, however, managed to keep me thoroughly confused. The words I was reading were English, but they made no sense because I did not understand the way they were being used. I am all about authentic dialogue, but this was too much. Most of the time the slang was not explained at all; you had to look it up in the glossary to understand what the heck was going on. The glossary was not super helpful either because Shannon did not do a good job of world building. She kept introducing new types of clairvoyants without fully explaining them. It was very, very frustrating. Okay, sorry, done ranting. Thank you for your patience!

Overall Diagnosis

Get A Second Opinion

• Debby at Snuggly Oranges - "The intricacy of the world building combined with the various mysteries really sucked me in. The story is original and it takes chances."
• Heather at The Flyleaf Review - "There is just so much to this story--so many complicated layers to this world that Shannon has built. It's actually almost too much to process if you want to know the truth. But at the same time, I don't think I would want it any other way."