Book Review: Initiation by Imogen Rose

Initiation
Bonfire Academy Book 1

Author: Imogen Rose
Paperback: 416 pages
Publisher: Imogen Rose (November 25, 2011)
Amazon Link

Note: I received a review copy of this book free from Red Adept Publishing. The review posted below is based on my personal thoughts while reading the book.

Ratings: ★ ★ ★ ★ 

My thoughts:

Initiation tells the story of Cordelia, a graduating demon student of Bonfire Academy, a private school located in Switzerland for the paranormal students. Cordelia is given a task to mentor a new student of the academy - Faustine, the first and only half human/half demon to enter the Bonfire Academy. She has yet to discover her powers so enrolling in the academy is a must for her.

Initiation is a good book. However, I had a problem with the characters of the story. I was thinking all along that Cordelia is the main character here but as I read further, more like half of the book, it seemed like Faustine is. I realized the author focused on Faustine's power and wrote so little about Cordelia's. I had the same problem with Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead. I began the series thinking that the main character is Rose Hathaway but then the author focused on Lissa Dragomir's power. That's one of the things I hated when I read the first book of the VA series.

Anyway, I had to do a little research on this book and found myself even more confused. I learned that Faustine has a book, entitled "Faustine", Book One of the Bonfire Chronicles and Initiation is the prequel series of the "Faustine" book. Knowing Initiation is a prequel of some book/s made me less excited to read book 2 of this series. Faustine and I have never truly connected. I hope the author would write more about Cordelia in book two and her power because honestly I hated reading about that half demon brat!

Pretending I didn't know about the Faustine book. I loved the plot of Initiation and the idea that there is a school for paranormal students, well, that's just new to me. Vampire academy has only vampires and dhampirs but Bonfire Academy has it all - demon, shifters, vampires, witches, faeries, maybe even angels, I'm not so sure about that as it was only mentioned once in the book. It's an action-packed book with all the paranormals fighting each other, or well sometimes they try to kill each other. I liked the academy's rules - one of the three main golden rules is "Trust no one" since all students have powers. A good demon like Cordelia can harm her friends if a witch casts a spell on her. Students are also not allowed to chitchat about their powers. If one chooses to reveal his/her power, that's okay but no one should ask questions about it. So mystery of the story - check! The pacing of the story well it flows just right. Check! Writing style, great. Check!

Initiation, as with all other YA books, has love triangle issue. Cordelia has a boyfriend, Quinn while she flirts with Jagger, who happens to also have a girlfriend.  I hate it when someone is cheating on his/her significant other. The author rarely wrote about one of those two guys so I have this theory etched in my head, that guy will be out in the picture eventually. But I hope not because I liked him better than the other!

Overall, Initiation has a good plot minus the love triangle and whiny half-human brat Faustine, it would have been five for me. 

About the book:

Welcome to Bonfire Academy! Set in the foothills of the alpine mountains in St.Moritz, this exclusive private school caters to a special kind of student. Enter at your own risk... but if you are human, you may not want to enter at all.

WARNING: This YA story is set in a school for paranormals who are very different from normal human teens. Thus, the language and some scenes might not be appropriate for younger YA readers. Recommended for those sixteen and above.

About the Author:

Imogen Rose is the author of the bestselling YA series, the Portal Chronicles. She was born in a small town in Sweden and moved to London in her twenties. After obtaining a PhD in immunology from Imperial College, she moved with her family to New Jersey, where she's been based for the past ten years.

For as long as she can remember, Imogen has dreamt stories. Stories that continued from night to night, from dream to dream. So, even as a child, going to bed was never an issue, just an anticipation of the story to come. 

PORTAL, Imogen's first novel, would have remained in her imagination, to be shared only with her daughter, Lauren, had her eight-year-old not insisted that she write it down. In the course of a month, Imogen typed while Lauren waited eagerly by the printer for the pages to appear, and a novel took shape. 

The warm reception PORTAL received encouraged her to continue with the story and the Portal Chronicles. Faustine is Imogen's first book in her new series, the Bonfire Chronicles. She has recently published INITIATION, the prequel to FAUSTINE.

Imogen is a self-confessed Hermès addict who enjoys shopping, traveling, watching movies and playing with her dog, Tallulah.