Thursday, April 25, 2013

ARC Review: Spirit (Elemental #3) by Brigid Kemmerer

The blurb as seen on Goodreads:
Release Date: May 28, 2013
Publisher: Kensington
432 Pages

With power comes enemies. Lots of them.

Hunter Garrity just wants to be left alone. He's learned the hard way that his unusual abilities come at a price. And he can't seem to afford any allies.

He's up to his neck in hostiles. His grandfather, spoiling for a fight. The Merrick brothers, who think he ratted them out. Calla, the scheming psycho who wants to use him as bait.

Then there's Kate Sullivan, the new girl at school. She's not hostile. She's bold. Funny. Hot. But she's got an agenda, too.

With supposedly secret powers rippling to the surface everywhere around him, Hunter knows something ugly is about to go down. But finding out what means he'll have to find someone he can trust.





 


“I’m not sure anyone has ever told you how this whole friendship thing is supposed to work, but…”

Hunter Garrity is confused. His whole life he’s been told one thing: pure elementals are dangerous and need to be removed. Hunter knows a pure elemental, in fact, he knows four and they’re not half bad. In fact, they’ve been known to save each other’s lives (and others) on occasion. But despite all of this, he still has his father’s training weighing heavily on his mind and where does that leave him? Well, in Spirit…nowhere. 

Spirit begins with Hunter being attacked in his own house by the crazy Calla still hell-bent on her plan to bring the Guides to town. This event, combined with the multiple others eventually get Hunter tossed out of his house. With nowhere to go, he finds welcome in the most unlikely of places: the Merricks. But Hunter’s reluctance to trust anyone opens up a whole new set of worms.

Before Spirit, I was a little unsure of Hunter. He was definitely the wild card of the bunch, never knowing what side he would fall on. I was also confused as to why he was getting his own book before Nick and Michael. While reading, I realized why Hunter’s story was being told now and also that even Hunter didn’t know who he was. 

“No one gives a shit about me until there’s a mess, and then suddenly everything is my fault! I can’t please anyone, and every time I try, I’m just one big fucking disappointment. Everyone is on me to pick a side. How the hell am I supposed to pick a side when everyone hates me?” 

He is so lost and so confused. My heart just broke for him. He was struggling and Kremmerer wrote his pain so raw that I found myself tearing up a few times.  Even when he was making stupid decisions (which he did, a lot), I still just wanted him to have a home – a family. There was definite growth of his character due to events that happened here and I’m anxious to see how they fair in future books. 

One character that I was not too fond of was Kate. When she first comes into their lives, I could not for the life of me figure out why Hunter was attracted to her besides her looks. She was obviously using her looks to get what she wanted, made herself come across as a ‘player’, and let’s not forget all the lying and backstabbing that was going around. Towards the end when she began opening up to Hunter, I could see why they would be good together, but I had to dig really deep. The initial attraction just wasn’t there for me. 

Something that surprised me though, was my newfound love of Michael. He stepped it up here and became the big brother everyone needed. I adored his relationship with Hunter and how he never pushed, he tried to just let Hunter trust him and come to him. Michael was the rock that literally held everyone together. 

The first day you meet, you are friends. The next day, you are brothers.

Sums up these characters and their relationships perfectly. This series definitely snuck up on me. I expected to like it, don’t get me wrong. But I didn’t expect it to take over the last week of my life. How am I ever going to wait until the next one?

Oh and two more things:
1. Nothing better ever happen to Casper
2. Gabriel + Hunter = Bromance 4ever
 
Thank you to Kensington for providing a copy of this ebook via Netgalley for review.

2 comments :

  1. Your review made me cry. Thank you so much. <3 <3 <3

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're so very welcome! Thank you for sharing the stories of these wonderful characters <3

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