REVIEW - Zoe + the Demon Slayer by Neel Kay

Title: Zoe + the Demon Slayer 
Author: Neel Kay
Release Date: October 6th 2014
Genres: NA Fantasy
Links: Goodreads / Amazon 

Source: Bought ebook

Summary:

Twenty-four year old book worm and blogger Zoe Graves was looking forward to the fourth and final installment of her favourite book saga – The Augustin Chronicles. The evening was meant to be spent in line at the local bookstore with hundreds of other fans, getting the book, maybe even meeting the author, and ultimately spending the night with the dreamiest hero of them all, Lucien de Forest and the love of his life Noomi Augustin. 

But somewhere someone thought otherwise. 

Confused and hurt after a mugging by the bookstore, Zoe is somehow transported to another world, and suddenly finds herself in a snow-covered landscape witnessing a bloody fight far away from the English summer, and is left to rely on the help from the rather reluctant Matis, who just happen to be out to kill none other than Zoe’s favourite hero and heroine, Lucien and Noomi. 

Although convinced she might be in some sort of limbo or maybe even in a coma, Zoe figures that her role in the story is to prevent Matis from killing her all-time favourite fictional couple.

4/5

After taking part in the book blitz for this book and reading some excerpts, I became really intrigued and was dying to read it. I am glad to say that I found myself really enjoying this imaginative fantasy tale. I always have a bit of admiration for authors that tackle the fantasy genre. The imagination needed for these types of books is astounding, and Ms Kay certainly did the genre justice. She has created a fascinating and captivating story that left me wanting more. I really enjoyed the characters. Zoe was a great protagonist and I loved following her on her journey through this new world. 

While I did really enjoy the book, I had one or two issues with it. Firstly, there were numerous grammar errors. It needed another round of edits I felt. Just before I began writing my review however, I saw that the author had noticed this and so published a new updated version, so I am happy about this.

Another problem I had was that, while the book was never dull, I felt that there was too much crammed into it. I think the story would have been better if it was fleshed out a bit more and maybe took up two books. Everything felt a little too fast-paced. Some scenes could have been dragged out a bit more, and I really would have preferred if the relationship between Zoe and Matis was more fleshed out and took longer to develop. It was too rushed for my liking. 

Having said all that though, I liked this book immensely and was completely engaged in the story. I'd recommend it to all fantasy lovers.