Review Detail

Riven, the title character in Amalie Howard's THE ALMOST GIRL, is a teenager from another world and a warrior. She has been sent to Earth to retrieve the brother of her king so that he can help the king survive a seemingly terminal disease. Cale is the king and Caden is the brother, and Riven has given her allegiance to the former and she eventually gives her love to the latter.

I wasn't a huge fan of the love story in THE ALMOST GIRL, but the action scenes are great. Howard has a good feel for describing fights, and the science part of this Science Fiction story is interesting--world hopping zombie warriors?! What's not to love about that?

I'm a big fan of strong editing, and I wish there had been a bit more of it in this book. Some scenes dragged on and had me flipping pages to get past them, but definitely not any that involved Riven's battles. Howard's sentences in those are crisp and detailed, and they were exactly what was needed to propel the story.

Ultimately, there are many compelling reasons to read this book: the world building is great, the action sequences (of which there are many) are awesome, and Riven is a complete bad ass teenager with understandable daddy issues. Plus there are zombies.

This book is the first in a series, and I'll definitely be picking up a copy of THE FALLEN PRINCE, the second book in The Riven Chronicles.