When the Sea is Rising Red

Author: Cat Hellisen

Release Date: February 28th, 2012

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

Genre(s): YA Fantasy/ Paranormal  

Pages: 296

*Stand alone*

Summary (from Goodreads):

After seventeen-year-old Felicita’s dearest friend, Ilven, kills herself to escape an arranged marriage, Felicita chooses freedom over privilege. She fakes her own death and leaves her sheltered life as one of Pelimburg’s magical elite behind. Living in the slums, scrubbing dishes for a living, she falls for charismatic Dash while also becoming fascinated with vampire Jannik. Then something shocking washes up on the beach: Ilven's death has called out of the sea a dangerous, wild magic. Felicita must decide whether her loyalties lie with the family she abandoned . . . or with those who would twist this dark power to destroy Pelimburg's caste system, and the whole city along with it. 

~Spoilers are hidden! Just highlight the page if you want to see them:)~

Review:

       I didn’t hate this book, but I didn’t like it either.  My main issue with this book was the lack of information about ANYTHING.  There was a lot of things (character nationality especially) that was not explained.  It seemed like the author was trying to avoid info dumping, but in her quest to do so, she leaned way too far on one side of the spectrum of info dumping and no info.  It was super distracting and confusing. (I had to reread some parts of the book to get a more detailed view of the plot.)  

Felicita (or Firell) was a meh character.  I felt like the author was trying to force us to like her, when in reality there was nothing about her to like.  She’s a bit shallow, but she does change somewhat throughout the novel, so that wasn’t really a major issue for me.  Felicita is a frustrating character.  She’s so dumb naïve.   Honestly, she makes the most thoughtless choices, and when there’s an easy out, she doesn’t take it.  She doesn’t really think about the alternative (and quite possibly reasonable) solutions either. 

The romance between Dash and Felicita was really rushed and abrupt, and I don’t know what the deal is with Felicita and Jannik (all of a sudden they’re married at the end?).  The plot was okay; again, I had a hard time following it because of the lack of explanations or info. 

Overall, this book was confusing, which distracted me from the characters and the great plot everyone seems to be referencing.  However, I did give it a two because it did keep me somewhat engaged (though for the life of me, I don’t remember what was so interesting about it.   Probably the hope that something would be explained later on?). 

Thanks for reading~!

Rating: 2 out of 5